The latest push by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) to review the existing rules on spam and to expand the definition of ‘commercial communications’ stems from the urgent need to establish stricter guidelines for autodialers or robocalls and filter pre-recorded messages and bulk texts, officials said. The explosion of complaints against unregistered telemarketers (UTMs), which hit 7.5 lakh till June-end in 2024, also necessitates a comprehensive overhaul of the government’s efforts to crack down on spam.
Last week, TRAI issued a consultation paper on reviewing the Telecom Commercial Communications Customer Preference Regulations, 2018 (TCCCPR-2018), the government’s main legal arsenal to battle the menace. Currently, spam is classified as “unsolicited commercial communication” (UCC), usually sent by UTMs.
“While existing regulations have successfully slashed complaints against registered telemarketers, a comprehensive overhaul would be required to stamp out spam from UTMs,” a TRAI official said. He pointed to complaints registered with telecom operators against these rogue callers swelling to 12.2 lakh in 2023, up from 3.07 lakh in 2020. On Tuesday, an official statement from TRAI pointed out this number continues to grow, hitting 7.5 lakh in just the first 6 months of 2024.
While there are about 16,000 registered telemarketers (RTM) in the country, telcos are currently required to act against UTMs by giving a warning, putting them under the “usage caps” for a fixed number of calls and messages per day, or disconnecting services for repeat violations. On the third instance of violations, telemarketing connections will be disconnected for a period of up to two years and blacklisted.
On Tuesday, TRAI said telcos have blacklisted over 50 entities and disconnected more than 2.75 lakh mobile numbers of various kinds.
Robocalls on the radar
Many entities have started making promotional calls using 10-digit mobile/landline numbers and are resorting to the use of autodialers or robocalls, bypassing regulatory provisions. Data collected by TRAI for the fourth quarter (January-March) of FY24 shows that less than 10 calls were made on average by 85.3 per cent of Subscriber Identity Modules (SIMs) in the country. On the other hand, just 136 SIMs saw between 500-1,000 calls being made every day. Stunningly, just 4 SIMs made more than 1,000 calls, or an average of 30,000-plus calls in a month.
The numbers are even more stark for text messages, where 1.11 crore SIMs making up 95 per cent of the telecom user base saw just 1 or fewer texts being sent per day in Q4. However, 47,427 SIMs, or a minuscule 0.004 per cent of the user base, were responsible for sending more than 100 texts per day.
In the consultation paper, TRAI has suggested making it mandatory for the sender to specifically seek user consent for automated calls and notifying the telcos in advance about the use of autodialers or robocalls for commercial communications. “We have also suggested that pre-recorded voice calls should have an approved content template, considering that frauds abound in that category of calls and ordinary citizens are harassed,” another official said.
Under current rules, a customer can also block all promotional communications and regulate the receipt of transactional communications. These measures may also be made stronger.
First Published: Sep 03 2024 | 6:44 PM IST
