Trai's DCA platform for stemming out spam, pesky calls in next 2-3 months

In the next two-three months, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) will launch a digital consent authorisation (DCA) platform in a bid to reduce spam and pesky calls, a report in The Economic Times (ET) said. The DCA will accelerate the process of getting consumer consent on the distributed ledger technology platform (DLT) mandated by Trai. 

"The DCA will be ready in two-three months. Currently, we are undertaking testing for it. Once it is rolled out, customers can whitelist their numbers on the platform," an official told ET. 

In 2018, Trai had asked telcos to deploy DLT systems where they will be required to create a ledger containing information from telemarketers and brands. It will also have templates for various messages. 

After the registration, the outgoing messages will be tallied with the template and the sender details. It will be sent out only if the message matches the template. The platform will be based on blockchain technology. 

Moreover, the brands will be required to take explicit consent from customers for the communication of their brands. Currently, customers have to unsubscribe from receiving the alerts using the DND service. 

The telemarketers will be required to honour the consent or face penalties. 

"In case there is no 'yes' or 'no' (response) from the customer, there would be a certain cooling off period (which will be decided soon) when the telemarketer won't be allowed to send any more promotional messages to customers. After the cooling off period, the telemarketer can again start sending messages," the official added.

On February 16, Trai had issued a directive and asked telcos to block all unverified headers and message templates within 30 and 60 days respectively.