Furnishing fake documents to procure a mobile sim car or manipulating your identity on over-the-top (OTT) platforms such as WhatsApp, Telegram, Signal or Telegram may land you in prison or a fine up to Rs 50,000, as per the provisions of the draft Indian Telecommunication Bill, 2022, according to an Economic Times report.
The penalties have been proposed in the draft Bill to protect telecom users from online fraud and illegal activities. Cybercriminals have been known to use fake documents to procure SIM cards for committing crimes and hide their identity on OTT apps for making calls to potential victims.
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The Department of Telecom (DoT) has put up the draft of the proposed draft telecom bill in the public domain for comments from various stakeholders and the general public. The DoT explained that the security measures mentioned above are necessary to help telecom users identify the person or entity reaching out to the call receivers.
“This will help in preventing cyber frauds done using telecom services. Therefore, provisions related to identity have been included in the Bill at relevant places,” the DoT mentioned in an explanatory note.
Sub-section 7 under Section 4 of the draft Bill requires stipulates that misrepresentation of identity can lead to imprisonment of up to 1 year, a fine of up to 50,000, the suspension of telecommunication services; or a combination of these. The offence as been labelled “cognisable”, which means that the police can arrest the perpetrator without any warrant or court permission.
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In the context of these security measures, Union Telecom Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw recently said the new Bill will address cyber crime on multiple fronts. He said robust Know Your Customer (KYC) compliance on part of OTTs will significantly help in reducing fraud.
It is important that the receiver of a call knows who is calling across various platforms as the distinction between a voice call and a data call has vanished. It is for this reason that all platforms including OTTs are brought under the same law.
The DoT has asked telecom regulator Telecom Regulatory Authority of India for a mechanism that will allow the caller’s name to flash on the screen when a call is received. This name would be as part of KYC documents of the telecom subscriber making the call.
