Banks compliant with Trai's new regulations on message traceability

Large commercial banks in the country are compliant with new Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) norms on message traceability, which came into effect from December 11, bankers aware of the development said.

 

According to senior public sector bank executives, all the mobile phone numbers are white labelled for call centres and compliances are in place as far as large commercial banks are concerned.

 

However, there may be challenges at the vendor (operator) level, as banks are working with certain telecom operators. These operators will need to address the issues on their end. 

And there is no clarity about the compliance of co-operative banks with the new norms.

 

The white labelling will help to avoid the number being tagged as spam by apps. So traceability is clear, the bank officials added.

 

Trai first issued directions in August 2024 mandating traceability for all commercial messages starting November 1, 2024. This was extended to December 1 and on the request from telecom providers for more time to upgrade their systems, the deadline was further extended to December 10.

 

The initiative intends to stop spam and fraudulent communication by making commercial messages fully traceable. The regulation applies to major telecom providers, including Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, BSNL, and Vodafone Idea.

 

Message traceability is a system designed to ensure that every commercial message sent to a recipient can be traced back to its origin. This enables identifying people involved including, from telemarketers to service providers.

 

According to the norms, any commercial message that does not comply with traceability requirements will be rejected. This includes messages where the sender-receiver chain is not defined. Telecom providers also have been asked to issue daily warnings to defaulters and block non-compliant messages.