 "Develop consent-driven anti spam tech within 2 months: TRAI to telcos")
In the latest effort to curb pesky calls and messages, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) has directed telecom companies to develop new Digital content authorisation (DCA) facilities within 2 months. The DCA will be a unified platform to seek, maintain and revoke the consent given by customers towards receiving commercial communication from businesses.
The sector regulator has directed telecom companies such as Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea, and BSNL, to develop and deploy DCA as a priority, officials said. Given the sheer volume of complaints against incessant promo calls and texts sent by businesses, the deadline will not be extended, they added.
Issued under TRAI's Telecom Commercial Communication Customer Preference Regulations, 2018 (TCCCPR-2018) on Saturday, the direction is set to be implemented in a phased manner immediately after the 2-month period ends.
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Back in March, Business Standard reported DCA was fast emerging as the favourite among a long list of technologies being researched by TRAI. Officials had then confirmed it was expected to be rolled out first on a pilot basis by end-May.
In the prevalent system, customer consent is obtained and maintained by Principal Entities (PEs) such as banks, financial institutions, insurance companies, trading companies, business entities, and real state companies, among others.
As a result, telecom service providers such as Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea, and BSNL, classified as Access Providers (APs), could not check the veracity of consent. Further, there is no unified system for customers to provide or revoke consent.
Changes to system
DCA will take customers’ consent for the brands or companies they would like to receive communication from. It will also expedite the process of receiving consumer consent on Digital Ledger Platform (DLT) platforms.
DLT platforms are digital systems for keeping and managing the record of sender IDs and templates run by telecom companies.
Businesses need to register on DLTs by submitting relevant details and get access to exclusive headers and message templates — keywords denoting a business or brand that pops up when a phone user receives a message.
The problem often starts when these businesses, legally classified as principal entities, purchase bulk short messaging services (SMS) from a telemarketer to send SMS texts to its clients and customers. Telemarketers have to be registered on the DLT platform.
"The new DCA facilities will enable the consent data to be collected on the DLTs quickly. Once a customer launches a complaint against a particular business, a telecom company can easily check the consent data and scrub the consent provided by said customer earlier," a Department of Telecommunications (DoT) official said over the phone.
Initially, PEs belonging to the Banking, Insurance, Finance and trading-related sectors shall be on-boarded to initiate the Consent Acquisition process, TRAI has said.
APs have been directed by TRAI to use a common short code 127xxx for sending consent-seeking messages. The purpose, scope of consent and PE or Brand name shall be mentioned clearly in the consent-seeking message sent through the shortcode. "Only whitelisted URLs/ APKs/OTT links/Call Back numbers etc shall be used in the consent-seeking messages. Further, APs shall develop an SMS/IVR/Online facility to register the unwillingness of the customers to
receive any consent-seeking messages initiated by any PE," TRAI said in the direction.
In the first phase, only subscriber-initiated consent acquisition has been permitted by TRAI. Subsequently, PE-initiated consent acquisition shall be permitted.
The DCA tech has been chosen after it got the backing of the Joint Committee of Regulators (JCOR), a key inter-ministerial body set up last year to frame an action plan to curb spam and frauds using telecom resources, officials said.