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The consultation process for dealing with issues rleated to KYC and spam calls will be initiated soon, noted Dr. P.D. Vaghela Chairman, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India at the India Mobile Congress on Sunday.
Addressing a panel on “Preventing Spam: How Blockchain is redefining RegTech revolution,” Vaghela stated that the regulator will be initiating a consultation process in areas of KYC and spam in order to deliberate regulations that allow the customer to know the identity of the caller calling them.
These consultations come at a time when the new draft telecom bill re-emphasized the Centre’s intent on curtailing spam and proposed that the identity of the person communicating using any form of telecommunication services shall be available to the user.
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However, a TRAI official said that OTT communication apps will not be under the consultation purview presently, even though the new draft telecom bill indicates the Centre’s intent to regulate WhatsApp, Signal, Instagram, Facebook, etc., as telecom services.
Civil liberty organizations and activists have raised concerns around OTT communication apps coming under the ambit of KYC, given that it is likely to infringe on the right to the anonymity of the users. Activists note that the right to privacy and anonymity is taken as a given when users sign on to internet communication services.
BusinessLine has reported previously that TRAI will be issuing a consultation for OTT apps soon, to deliberate if and how they should be regulated.
According to Vaghela spam communication has gone down by 15 per cent in the past year.
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