The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) will hold a meeting with all the telecom services providers on March 27, 2023, to discuss ways to counter the issue of menacing unsolicited commercial calls (UCC) , or unwanted text messages and calls. TRAI aims at exploring a multi-prolonged approach to address the problem through technical solutions , regulations , directions and close monitoring.
A meeting was set in late-February 2023 of joint committee of regulators (JCOR) to implement solutions to counter the menace of UCC. JCOR consists of TRAI, Reserve Bank of India, Securities and Exchanges Board of India (SEBI) and Ministry of Consumer Affairs (MoCA). The telecom regulator had also issued rules back in July 2018 making it mandatory for telcos to seek customer consent for receiving UCC from telemarketers.
TRAI’s upcoming meeting will discuss the formulation of a framework for sharing of UCC data detected by access providers on the distributed ledger technology (DLT) platform and strict action on principal entities and registered tele-marketers (RTMs) for non-compliance. Ways to use artificial intelligence/machine learning based anti-phishing systems, implementation of reg tech solutions the DLT platform for promotional voice calls etc. will also be discussed.
