Over 1.24L telecom connections blocked or disconnected in July-September: TRAI
What's the story
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has taken strict action against over 1.24 lakh telecom connections, including mobile numbers, in the July-September quarter of this year. The move is part of TRAI's ongoing efforts to combat unsolicited commercial communications (UCCs). The regulator barred a total of 1,10,325 telecom connections from outgoing services for 15 days on first violation and disconnected another 13,777 for one year due to repeat violations.
Enforcement measures
TRAI also blocked 3,725 SMS headers
Along with barring telecom connections, TRAI also blocked 3,725 SMS headers and blacklisted 374 senders for a year.
During this period, these entities cannot obtain fresh telecom resources.
The regulator received a whopping 15.29 lakh complaints of unsolicited commercial communications in the quarter under review.
Of these complaints, some were found actionable while others were not.
App usage
How the quarter under review fared
The TRAI DND App was the major platform for reporting spam during this period, accounting for 92.9% of all complaints received.
By September 30, the app had recorded 42.36 lakh downloads.
AI-based systems used by telecom operators flagged 19.9 billion incoming calls and SMSes as suspected spam during this quarter alone, 18.28 billion calls and 1.62 billion messages were included in this count.
Operator actions
Telecom operators issued over 45.9 lakh warning notifications
Telecom operators issued over 45.9 lakh warning notifications to suspected spam senders during this quarter.
They also conducted electronic know-your-customer (e-KYC) verification of 34,025 suspected senders. If these senders failed the KYC verification process, they were disconnected from the network.
TRAI has introduced a dedicated numbering series for promotional calls to help consumers differentiate between service and transactional communications.
Consumer protection
DND preferences registered by consumers
The 140 series is used for promotional calls while the 1600 series is reserved for service and transactional calls by entities in banking, financial services, insurance, and government-to-citizen communications.
The report revealed that as of September 30, 22.449 crore consumers had registered their preferences on the DND registry.
This constitutes 16.64% of India's total subscriber base of 134.9 crore.