Spam Alert! Fed Up of Unwanted SMS Messages, Indians Seek An End

Mobile users in India are fed up with constant spam messages and it is only going to get worse in 2019.

You’ve got a spam message and there’s no way to stop it coming.

(Photo: iStock)

Peeyush Sharma works for a marketing firm in Mumbai which means most of the day goes in making calls or taking one. But even for a phone-addict like Sharma, unwanted SMS spam messages are a menace and nothing has helped his cause. Not even registering for the “do not disturb” registry for telecom operators.

Sharma is one of many people in the country who are fed up of getting spam messages/calls and the telcos have to take most of the blame for this. This has made India the second-most spam riddled country in the world, an unwanted label for sure.

A recent report from LocalCircles has surveyed more than 12,000 participants to get their opinion on spam SMS and how big an issue it is for them.

It’s a Daily Nuisance

The LocalCircles survey found that more than 78 percent of the respondents were getting four or more spam SMS every day. Which turns out to be 28 SMS on an average in a week and if 78 percent of 12,000 people are saying this, then telcos have a big problem on their hands.

Speaking of telcos, 34 percent people said that at least a quarter of the unwanted SMS messages are coming from the service provider itself. This is where entities like the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) and Department of Telecom (DoT) need to intervene and ask telcos to stop with the spamming.

Most spam SMS come from real estate, insurance and banking services.

Interestingly enough, TRAI had released a regulation to counter the spam SMS issue, but businesses have hardly adhered to it and the issues faced by consumers clearly show that.

TRAI in May 2018 had released its draft Telecom Commercial Communication Customer Preference Regulation 2018, which is specifically designed to counter the menace of unwanted SMSs. This regulation requires that customer consent be explicitly recorded by a third party and be activated only after subscribers’ confirmation. But apparently, spammers have happily been flouting rules.

LocalCircles

The only possible way to control this issue is either fine the tele-marketers for breaching the rules or make DND registries effective.

Nobody Stops Disturbing

The survey mentions that according to TRAI, as of May 2018, 23 crore mobile subscribers registered on the DND registry, which as we found isn’t that useful.

Registering for DND hardly helps, with 70 percent people from the survey still getting unwanted SMS from spammers. 

While a majority of people have signed up for DND registry, only six percent of the crowd said that the registry works and they don’t get unwanted messages. Businesses, including telcos realise that SMS is a cost-effective way of sending information, but it’s high time that regulators take a strong stand against those involved in such activities.

Especially with the General Elections taking place the chances of a spam invasion from political parties and their assigned partners is high.