TRAI’s Continued Efforts to Combat Spam Calls and SMS Abuse

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has taken significant measures to curb the menace of spam calls and prevent the misuse of SMS headers and content templates by unscrupulous elements in forwarding malicious/fraudulent messages. These measures are aimed at safeguarding consumer interests and ensuring a clean and secure messaging ecosystem.

Key Actions Taken:

1. Stringent Measures against Spam Calls: TRAI issued Directions on 13th August 2024, mandating that any entity found to be making promotional voice calls in violation of regulations would face strict consequences. This includes disconnection of all telecom resources, blacklisting for up to two years, and a ban on new resource allocation during the blacklisting period. In response to these directions, over 800 entities/individuals have been blacklisted, and more than 18 lakh SIP DID/Mobile Numbers/Telecom resources have been disconnected which is a significant step towards cleansing the systems of commercial calls.
2. Mandatory URL, APK, and OTT Link Whitelisting: In compliance with TRAI’s Directions dated 20th August 2024, Access Providers have implemented mandatory whitelisting of URLs, APKs, or OTT links in messages with effect from 1st October 2024. This way, only safe and approved links can get through the SMS, protecting consumers from harmful or fake websites, apps, or other online threats.
3. Migration for Telemarketing Calls to the Distributed Ledger Technology (Blockchain) platform: With effect from 1st October 2024, Telemarketing calls starting with the 140xx numbering series have been migrated to the Distributed Ledger Technology (Blockchain) platform for strict monitoring and control.
4. Enhanced Message Traceability: Access Providers have implemented technical solutions to ensure traceability of entities (Senders/Principal Entities) involved in sending a message to recipients. This new system ensures that each person who handles the message, from the sender to the final delivery, is tracked. This involves defining Principal Entity (PE)-Telemarketers (TMs) chain through which messages travel before reaching the Access Provider. To provide a transition time for awareness, technical upgrades, and chain declaration, TRAI, vide its Direction dated 28th October 2024, in partial modification of its earlier Direction dated 20th August 2024, has directed Access Providers to ensure PE-TM chain declaration by all PEs and TMs at the earliest, and the PEs and TMs who default on PE-TM chain binding to be issued a warning by respective Access Providers on daily basis until 30th November 2024. With effect from 1st December 2024, any traffic (messages) where the chain of Telemarketers is not defined or does not match with pre-defined chain shall be rejected.