The Indian government has ordered the country’s telcos to implement blocks on inbound international calls that present an Indian mobile number as the originating CLI. A press release issued on Sunday by the Ministry of Communications states:
It has been reported that fraudsters are making international spoofed calls displaying Indian mobile numbers to Indian citizens and committing cyber-crime and financial frauds. These calls appear to be originating within India but being made by the cyber-criminals from abroad by manipulating the calling line identity (CLI). Such international spoofed calls have been misused in recent cases of fake digital arrests, FedEx scams, drugs/narcotics in courier, impersonation as Govt and police officials, disconnections of mobile numbers by DoT/TRAI officials, etc.
Therefore, Department of Telecommunications (DoT) and Telecom Service Providers (TSPs) have devised a system to identify and block such incoming international spoofed calls from reaching any Indian telecom subscriber. Now directions have been issued to the TSPs for blocking of such incoming international spoofed calls.
India is one of a growing number of countries that already protects phone users from receiving international calls that have spoofed a domestic landline number. This new press release provides no deadline for the additional block on calls presenting a domestic mobile number, nor does it say anything about how such blocks will continue to permit the connection of genuine calls from Indians who call home whilst roaming abroad. However, many countries have been working on the technical feasibility of national coordination schemes where telcos can interrogate the data in each other’s Home Location Registers (HLRs) to determine if a number is associated with a phone that was most recently reported to be roaming abroad. Indian telcos have already shown themselves to be adept with implementing advanced new consumer protection technologies, including the use of a blockchain for the national allow list for A2P SMS messages, and a national telemarketing register that captures each individual phone user’s preferences for who may or may not contact them.
Commsrisk began championing the use of blocks on international calls that spoof domestic numbers in 2022, following upbeat reports of its effectiveness in Australia and the UK. It was characterized as ‘the method with no name’ to distinguish it from methods that have names because they are being marketed by vendors or associations that also hope to generate revenue from new consumer protection controls. Thankfully, the lack of marketing support has not discouraged national regulators and telcos from copying each other’s successes, and there has been an acceleration in the number of countries choosing to adopt this control. The absence of patents or other intellectual property rights may have actually helped with the rapid spread of this control from one country to another. The regulators of 46 European countries turned the method into a de facto international standard with the publication of ECC Recommendation 23(03) in November 2023, though that is still not a name that rolls easily off the tongue.
Sadly, there are still some countries where the authorities openly oppose consumer protection controls of this type because they have prioritized the interests of big business over ordinary people. To make matters worse, corrupted anti-fraud associations like the Communications Fraud Control Association (CFCA) continue to aggressively favor the ambitions of US multinationals that lobby against blocks on spoofed international calls. They do this although any half-competent professional now knows that alternative controls take much longer to implement, cost a lot more, and deliver much weaker protection for consumers. A section of this global industry is turning a blind eye to scams and spam that blight people’s lives today because they want to generate income from cross-border telemarketing although such traffic will always be abused by spammers and scammers. Thankfully, the global tide has turned decisively. This latest announcement from India will encourage more Asian countries to follow the same approach.
If you live in a country that refuses to implement this control, please increase the pressure on your comms regulator. Their inaction is putting profit before people. Remind them that every country which decides to block spoofed international calls is another nail in the coffin for the US plan to hand more power over cross-border telemarketing traffic to a private sector consortium run by US businesses. Every country should now be implementing blocks on spoofed inbound international calls.
