The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on March 15 updated regulations to disallow telecom subscribers to port out of their current network provider if they have “swapped” their SIM card, after loss or damage of a previous card, within the past seven days. The regulations prohibit telecom operators to issue a “unique porting code” (UPC) which is the first step of changing providers using mobile number portability.
This amendment would “result in preventing [the] porting of mobile connections soon after SIM swapping/ replacement, by fraudsters in the name of new subscribers,” the TRAI said in an explanatory memorandum.
The move is part of several anti-spam measures the TRAI has taken, even as fraudulent and spam calls surge as a concern. Previous steps include creating a do-not-disturb registry for subscribers to opt out of spam, releasing a now-defunct app to enforce that registry by allowing users to more conveniently file complaints against errant telemarketers, and requiring all transactional SMS messages by businesses to be as per a format registered with telecom operators, barring which they get filtered out.
The TRAI has also recommended to the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) a feature that would display the legally registered name of every caller on recipients’ handsets, a feature that drew some criticism on privacy grounds. The DoT has launched Chakshu, its own portal for reporting “suspected fraud communication”.
The DoT had asked the TRAI to examine a suggestion that telecom firms be required to match the identity of subscribers when they port out from one operator to another. Currently, mere possession of an unblocked SIM is considered sufficient, and know-your-customer processes are done afresh, a policy that benefits minors (who legally cannot get SIM cards in their names), or other dependents whose SIMs aren’t registered in their names. The TRAI said that this suggestion — of double-checking KYC during porting — will be “examined separately”.
