TRAI convenes a meeting with representatives from RBI, SEBI, IRDAI, ANMI, banks and TSPs for allocation of 160 series to make transactional and service calls

TRAI had convened a meeting on June 14, 2024, which was attended by the representatives from Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI), more than 25 banks and other financial institutions including government, private and global banks, members of Association of National Exchanges Members of India (ANMI) and all telecom service providers (TSPs).

Key points deliberated during the meeting include the following:

• On the recommendations of TRAI, 160 series has been allocated exclusively for making transactional and service voice calls. In the first stage, it has been earmarked for all entities regulated by RBI, SEBI, IRDAI and Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA). Once it is implemented, it shall help in the easy identification of the calling entity and will prevent the duping of innocent citizen from the fraudsters. The meeting provided a platform for exchange of ideas amongst the regulators, entities and TSPs regarding the effective utilisation of this series. In addition, the operation of 140 series, at present being used for promotional purpose, is being migrated to distributed ledger technology (DLT) platform and scrubbing of digital consent is also being operationalised. With the implementation of above two measures, substantial control on spam calls from 10-digit numbers is expected.
• The Digital Consent Facility (DCA) established by TSPs under TRAI’s TCCCPR-2018 Regulations was discussed in detail. The DCA facility enables acquisition of digital consent of the customer and further enables senders such as banks, insurance companies and other entities to send promotional communications over SMS and voice to customers irrespective of their do-not-disturb (DND) status.
• The role and obligations of senders such as banks, insurance companies and other entities with respect to TRAI regulations was also deliberated and it was decided to whitelist uniform resource locators (URLs)/ android application packages (Apks) in the content templates, use of minimum number of headers and content templates, taking immediate action against the entity/trademark (TM) in case of misuse of senders’ credential etc.
• All the regulators, banks and other financial institutions emphasised the need to work collaboratively to curb the menace of spam, particularly through voice calls and assured all cooperation for implementation of various initiatives by TRAI in a time bound manner.