Daybreak - Truecaller beat Trai to the punch with spam-call fix

Episode Date: October 24, 2024

For a country that boasts of its digital public goods infrastructure like Aadhar and UPI, it is a wonder why telecom has been so ignored. After nearly 1500 crore rupees of was reportedly lost to digital fraud in the financial year 2024, the govt’s Trai is finally scrambling to catch up with CPAN or the Calling Name Presentation (CNAP) service, its own version of Truecaller.  Truecaller, the Swedish call-screening company, meanwhile, has been holding the fort for a while now. Users count on it to save them from spam and fraud calls.  While TrueCaller maybe looking like a hero in this situation, it is a private company after all. It is using this opportunity to make money from both users and businesses. But its success in India is also built partially on how inadequate privacy laws are in India. The company has been accused of breaching data privacy norms in the past.  Can TRAI replace Truecaller?  Tune in.(This episode was first published in July, 2024)DAYBREAK UNWIND RECOMMENDATIONS for "coming of age"Rahel: Big Mouth, NetflixSnigdha: The Lives of Girls and Women by Alice Munro and Lady Bird (2017)Atish Deore: The works of PL Deshpande, a Marathi author and playwright Shubhangi: Derry Girls (2018)Brijesh: Where The Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens   Daybreak is now on WhatsApp at [phone]. For next Thursday's Unwind, send us your recommendations to us as texts or voice notes. The theme is "favourite translated books."              

Hi, this is Rohan Dharma Kumar. If you've heard any of the Ken's podcasts, you've probably heard me, my interruptions, my analogies, and my contrarian takes on most topics. And you might rightly be wondering why am I interrupting this episode too. It's for a special announcement. For the last few months, I and Sita Raman Ganeshan, my colleague and the Ken's deputy editor, have been working on an ambitious new podcast. It's called Intermission.

We want to tell the secret sauce stories of India's greatest companies. Stories of how they were born, how they fought to survive, how they build their organizations and culture, how they manage to innovate and thrive over decades, and most importantly, how they're poised today. To do that, Sita and I have been reading books, poring over reports, going through financial statements, digging up archives, and talking to dozens of people. And if that wasn't enough, we also decided to throw in video into the mix. Yes, you heard that right. Intermission has also had to find its footing in the world of multi-camera shoots in professional studios, laborious editing, and extensive post-production.

Sita and I are still reeling from the intensity of our first studio recording. Intermission launches on March 23rd. To get an alert as soon as we release our first episode, please follow Intermission on Spotify and Apple Podcasts or subscribe to the Ken's YouTube channel. You can find all of the links at the ken.com slash I am. With that, back to your episode. Hi, I've been down with a bad goal,

so I'm pushing out this super interesting episode on True Caller today that we published a few months ago. With nearly 1,500 crore rupees lost to digital friends, fraud in the financial year 2024, Truecaller, the Swedish call screening app, has emerged looking like the savior of the moment. The government's telecom regulatory authority of India, on the other hand, is lagging behind with its Truecaller-like service. So can it do what Truecaller has done?

Stay tuned to find out. Dhrashdie Singh is a Mumbai-based lawyer who has a 12-year-old son. In May this year, she got a phone call from a stranger, a man, saying that her son was in an accident. The man told her that he was taking her son to the hospital and that he would need 30,000 rupees immediately. Now, I know in your mind you're immediately thinking, well, this sounds like a scam. But if you put yourself in Droshti's shoes, it is her son we're talking about. What if it were true? Every minute counts, right? It's a matter of life and death. So she transferred the money and rushed to her son's school. He was, as you may have expected by now, perfectly fine. She tried to

that number many, many times, but it was already switched off. So she went ahead and did the next logical thing. She lodged a police complaint. And the next step? Report it to the telecom authority or try, right? But that's not what Trashty did, nor did any of the other tele-scam victims that we spoke to. In fact, they seemed pretty clueless about going to try for telecom frauds.

But they all knew true caller, the Swedish call ID app. So, they reported all these numbers to True Caller and not try. So, True Caller seems to be basically stepping in to do what Try should be doing, right? But of course, it is also taking full advantage of this. It is using this opportunity to make money from both users and other businesses. Also, very important to note here is that while True Caller may be looking like the hero in this situation, it is a private company after all. And its success in India is also built.

partially on how inadequate privacy laws are here. The company has been accused of breaching data privacy norms in India. So what is the government up to? With nearly 1500 crore rupees being lost to digital frauds in the financial year 2021, the government is finally scrambling to catch up. The new government's first 100-day plan includes enabling try to tackle spam and scam calls. But can try match up to Truecaller? Welcome to Daybreak, a business podcast from the KEN.

I'm your host, Nagda Sharma, and I don't chase the news cycle. Instead, every day of the week, my colleague Rahal Philipos and I will come to you with one business story that is worth understanding and worth your time. Today is Monday, the 8th of July. For a country that boasts of its digital public goods infrastructure like Adhahr and UPI, it is amazing how telecom has been so ignored. So much so that a foreign private company, is doing its job. So what does Truecaller really do? It's quite simple. It gives users the power of

choice. They can decide which calls they want to take. And with the deluge of scam and spam calls that we receive, this is essential now. So Truecaller has become a user's constant companion that allows them the option to block such numbers and also mark them as fraud and spam. The company uses a crowdsource data model to mark phone numbers as spam. My colleague Ronner Kumar Gunjin spoke to two former True Caller executives. They said that they did not know exactly how many such markings were required for the company to push a phone number into the spam basket, but one of them did say that it varies according to the type of scam.

True Caller is basically offering welfare as a service. It offers a premium subscription starting at $132. And with it, you get features like, zero ads, call recording and a lot more. In the March 2020-4 quarter, Truecaller generated over $1 million US dollars in monthly revenue from its nearly 2 million premium subscribers in India. This is a 20% increase in average revenue per premium user in India compared to the same period last year. But there is a flip side to this.

Stay tuned to find out. So when a retail user reports annoying calls, businesses trying to reach a customer to deliver items or to inform them about a bill's due date to face rejection. True caller saw an opportunity here to make itself another revenue stream, an enterprise division. So businesses like lenders, e-commerce companies and telcos that use call centers want to partner with true caller to make sure their calls are taken. Industry executives say that a verified tag lets businesses identify their businesses identify their

themselves to people as legitimate organizations. Take, for example, perfect finance. It is a South Delhi-based non-bank that mostly deals with two-wheeler and three-wheeler financing. The small-sized lender wanted to focus on a higher-income group and target customers of more expensive second-hand two-wheelers. An executive there told us that the first hurdle was in reaching out to potential customers. Initial calls were answered, but soon called rejection rates soared. New leads dried up and there was no progress towards breaching a new income group.

It was only a couple of months later that the company's sales executives found out that true caller users had marked their phone numbers as spam. So to undo the impact of true caller users, the lender now wants to tie up with true caller's enterprise division. The former true caller executives said to us that true caller carries out an internal seven-step process before granting the verified tag. On average, the tag easily improves call pickup rates by 30% and some companies even report a 50% rise.

The verified tag also has another advantage for enterprises that not many know about. The number of spam markings that are required to push a verified enterprise's phone number in the red is much higher than what is needed for an unverified one. But the executive said even then if the business attracts spam or fraud markings, then it is pushed into the red. Once a number is declared as spam or fraud, on Truecaller, it cannot be undone. The company does not deal as numbers from the spam category in exchange of money. Because that would kill the purpose of True Caller itself.

So you see, in a situation where retail users cannot stand spam calls, and businesses, on the other hand, want to reach out to more customers, True Caller is gaining the most. Meanwhile, Try is still figuring out. out how to step in. And what makes Try different from Truecaller is that its end goal is consumer protection and not profit. But Telco's are not very happy with Try's proposal. Stay tuned to find out why. So Try is now pushing for the quick implementation of something called the calling name presentation service or SNAP, which has actually been in the work since 2022. But before I tell you

what it is, just a quick reminder, India has the world's second-lawful telecom network with 1.2 billion subscribers. SNAP is basically the government's version of a caller ID function, quite similar to true caller, but for free. This month, telecom operators like Bharty Airtel, Vodafone Idea and Reliance Geo launched trial sessions across states such as Maharashtra and Haryana. Now, Try wants to zero in on a launch date for SNAP and it also wants to make it compulsory for all.

and this is what is bothering the big telcos. So the plan for the telecom operators is to help share a caller's identity with the receiver and give them the right to make an informed choice about receiving calls. Now, unlike True Callers' crowdsource model, telcos will be using the K-YC or know-your-c customer data of users shared during SIM card registrations. A Vodafone executive told us that this addresses the issue of wrong names popping up on the phone screen, which often happens with Truecaller. But the concern here is privacy.

They said and I'm quoting, if the proposal is implemented, it will become compulsory for all. Where is consent? There needs to be an opt-in service. Not everybody wants to share their identity with others. End quote. In the case of Truecaller,

people have that choice to download the app or stay away from it. Try to, needs to come up with such an option. But in either case, it is a lose, loose, for the end user because they will have to part with their data irrespective of whichever service they opt in for.

A senior Aetal executive said that Telcos had opposed the umbrella launch of their service. They had even proposed to restrict the feature only for commercial calls, that is, a receiver should know which company is calling them, much like True Caller for business. But now, with the SNAP plan, the responsibility has transferred from TRI to TELCOs. It has asked them to specifically cater to consumer customers. complaints related to spam calls by creating a dedicated team if they don't have one already, and also making their websites more user-friendly. So for now, Try seems to think that the best way to do this is to pass on the challenge

of tackling True Caller to the telcos. Hang on because this episode is not over yet. Coming up next, Daybreak Unwind. Hello and welcome back to another daybreak Unwine segment. We are so happy to be here. Like you know, it is Thursday. and Snigda and I are here to help you but more importantly to help each other

figure out what to do over the weekend. Right, you know whether it's you're chilling at home, reading a book or watching a movie or a TV show or even if you are up for it which I don't think I will be this weekend stepping out to check out a cool new place in town whether it's a bookstore or a restaurant

you know. The reason Sigda's saying she's not feeling up to it is because I mean if you're in In Bangalore, you know this. The weather has been all over the place and both of us have taken turns to fall terribly, terribly ill. So it's a good thing that this week's theme is conducive to staying indoors. Our theme this week and I have to admit I'm very, very excited. I would go as far as saying that this week's theme is my favorite so far.

Oh, okay, okay. We asked you to share your favorite coming of age, film. books, TV shows. And can I just say, you guys did not disappoint. That is true. There are some really good recommendations that we have. And some of them are, you know, Rahil and mine, my personal favorites. And some of them are quite new.

So that's a great mix. But before we get there, Rahil, what is? Why are we talking about coming of age? Okay, this is my favorite topic to talk about. because coming of age, like as a genre, all these like films and movies and books just bring me so much joy. Okay, it generally captures kind of like a period of transition, right?

From youth to adulthood. So all those big life changes. And the thing that I really love about this genre is that more often than not, it's capturing some really messy bits of life. Exactly. You know? Yeah.

You know how growing up is this really complicated, beautiful, but like very, very messy experience, right? That all those intricacies. that sometimes are just so hard to put down in words and kind of describe for yourself. That's true. Like, you know, it's always about, you know, I really feel as I grow older, maybe because I'm older now. But I feel like we constantly have these coming of age phases in our life.

You know, it doesn't have anything to do with age, you know, because self-discovery and, you know, learning a certain kind of truth about your life. It's like an ongoing process that goes on. Like, you know. That's actually very true. That is a great point. But sometimes those things happen so internally and in such like imperceptible ways, right?

It's really hard to kind of communicate them to other people but sometimes when you see it perfectly captured in like a film or a show or a book, I don't know, it just feels so special. True, that's so true. Yeah. I mean, for me, you know, it's so funny that we're talking about this because, you know, the last two years

for me have really been a very different kind of coming of age, you know? Really? So, yeah. Rahir, why don't you tell us, why don't you start with your recommendation? Okay. So my recommendation is this Netflix show that I very often turn on and watch, like when I'm feeling down. It's called Big Mouth. It's this animated series and it's kind of centered around a bunch of teens that are hitting puberty.

It is hilarious, but that is also really, really disgusting. Okay. You know what I said? like some really great coming of age films and shows capture like the messy bits. Yeah. This captures the messiest, grossest bits. Give me an example. Give us an example.

So, okay, so basically, like I said, it's centered around a bunch of teens. They're all hitting puberty around the same time. And what happens is they all get assigned these individual hormone monsters. No one addresses the fact that it's weird, but it's there. Everyone has their own hormone monsters. And they're all like these invisible friends. friends that they have. And they have a very big role to play in the whole show.

So they're kind of guiding them through puberty. But in real, it's basically like your hormone monster is a manifestation of puberty. And the disgustingness of puberty. Okay. This is such a great concept. It's great. If you've not watched it, I would definitely recommend checking it out. It's a very specific kind of humor, but it's a kind of humor that I enjoy.

So yeah, I'd love to know what you think. Stigda and you know what our listeners think also if you've checked it if you watched it or if you watch it you know over the weekend please write to us I love talking about big mouth but yeah just for a little more context there are seven seasons of the show and each season the cast grows a year older so you literally see them transition from like gross grubby teenagers to like slightly less grubby young adults and it's just it's great so much fun that's a much fun that's a amazing. I'm definitely going to check it out. Snigda, I'm so excited to hear your recommendation this week.

Okay, so I have two. One is a book. And it's called The Lives of Girls and Women by this very famous Canadian writer called Alice Monroe, who actually just died this year, I think, in May. And she's of course brilliant. You know, I love short stories. I love Alice Monroe. anybody who likes short stories will definitely know Alice Monroe. But this one is a novel, the one that I'm recommending. And, you know, they often compare her to Anton Chekhov because of the brilliance of her writing.

But again, I really don't like those kind of comparisons. You know, Alice Manro is Alice Manro and Chekhov is Chekhov, you know. But, okay, getting to the book. So I kind of, I have very fond memories of, you know, reading it for the first time. I was, I think, in my early 20s. And that was also another coming of age phase of my life, you know. And somebody actually, it's so funny because it was my first visit to Bangalore and it was my first visit to Blossoms. And someone bought this book for me. And then I went back to Delhi and I read it. And it's about a young teenage girl who's

Actually, it's semi-autobiographical. So a lot of it is based on her own experience growing up in rural Canada. So this young girl, she's growing up in rural Ontario, and her father's a fox farmer. So, you know, she's grown up around nature and wild. And, you know, as you're reading the book, you can kind of see how it's shaping her, you know. It's very, very beautifully depicted. And then she's growing up with these very interesting set of people. father is a very unique character. Then her mother, you know, and this is early 40s, right,

that we're talking about. So like, you know, and it's a rural place, you know, everybody goes, goes to church. But then her mother is this outlier. She does not. She's an atheist and she believes in science and she sells encyclopedias. So she goes around everywhere selling encyclopedias and she takes her job very seriously. So it's very beautiful, the mother-daughter relationship, the father-daughter relationship. And again, her mother's, one of my favorite characters in the book is her mother's best friend. And I don't remember her name, but she's this very different, you know, among all the people who live in that area. She kind of stands out because she's like really independent. She's very open about her desires as a woman. And you know how all of these people kind of

shape this little girl? And then she has her friends. and there's also a small town scandal involved. It's such a good book. I love that. She captures, you know, she captures growing up as a girl, as a, like, and, you know, turning into that woman and all these learnings that you have. It's just so beautiful. And your second recommendation is kind of linked to that too, right?

Yeah, actually, yeah. It's, you know, you watch this movie, right? I love this movie. It's a beautiful movie. called Lady Bird and it's by directed by Greta Gervig and um it's got Sir Sharonan who does such a fab job right and it's about yeah growing up she she grows up in some where does she grow up Rahil do you remember that uh Philly no not in Philly I remember she was dreaming of moving to the big to New York yeah and she's obviously not in New York but that's her dream and then

she's a teenager and her really relationship with her mother, you know, and the intricacies of, you know, her mother-daughter relationship again is so beautifully shown, like the fights that they have, how she's always looking for her mother's approval, but her mother is a working-class woman, so she doesn't have the time for emotions, right? And she just feels so misunderstood the whole movie. And you're just watching it and you're like, oh my God, like, get over yourself and at the same time relating so hard to it the whole time. I know I was this like teenager who was like rebel, like one full on rebel without a cause

and so like intense. There's this such a good scene where they're fighting in the car. Her mother's driving. Oh my God. And she just jumps out. And she just jumps out. Oh my God. And Timothy Shalami plays the perfect, I mean, sorry to use this word, but this is a common word now.

I mean, better get with the program, people. It's called fuckboy. So he's like the perfect fuck boy, you know, that she kind of falls for her and then falls out of love with, right? It's very nice. And Rahia, you saw it with your mom, you told me. I did because I think for me, Lady Bird was that mother-daughter relationship.

Like, that defined the movie for me. And I related so hard to it. So my mom and I watched it together and she loved it just as much as I did. So yeah, great recommendation. Love Lady Bird. All right. Shall we get to our listeners' recommendations now? Let's do our listeners' recommendations.

The first one I'm really excited about Snigda. Atish Diorre, one of our listeners from Nasik. I'm terribly sorry if I've mispronounced your last name, Atish. He has a great recommendation for us. He's recommended a Marathi author and playwright called PL Deshpande. And I have to admit, I was not familiar with his work. But please listen to Artis. and I'm sure he will inspire you to look up PL Deshpande's work just as much as he inspired us too.

Hello, people at the Ken. So my recommendations are from this Marathi playwriter and author called PL Deshpande or as we like to call him Pula. He's known for his satire and social commentary. He's quite well known in Maharashtra actually. his most notable work would be Vyhti and Wali, Ti Fulahani and Butta-echesar. These two adaptations of his short stories which I really like, Duniadari and Ashi Banwa Banvi. You guys should check it out.

All right. And thank you for that recommendation, Atish. I'm definitely going to, I hope there are good translations because, you know, one of the biggest reasons, one of my biggest actually gripes with the publishing industry in India is like how we don't have good translations of regional writing, you know, in English. You know, but I've read some great translations also. Yeah? Yeah, I've read some really good, I think we should save this for a daybreak, unwind episode.

Oh, that's a good idea. Okay. Okay. What are that? Stay tuned. Okay, our next recommendation is Shibangi from New Delhi and I love her recommendation. I'm obsessed with this show. Hi, I'm Shibhangi and my recommendation for the theme coming of age is this funny, heartwarming and brilliant show called The Derry Girls.

It follows a group of five friends as they grew up in Derry and Northern Ireland in the backdrop of a conflict called The Troubles. The show does a fantastic job on focusing on friendship, growing up and what it means to be a teenager. I think despite the grim context, the show is actually quite lighthearted, feel good and an absolute delight to watch over a weekend. Okay, we got one international recommendations, Nikita. Brigitte from Toronto has sent in his recommendation and he recommends where the Croddard Singh. Oh my God. Another very beautiful movie. It's based on a book, right?

Yeah, but it's based on a book. There's a film as well. Have you seen the film and read the book? I have only seen the film. I've not read the book. It's beautiful. A great recommendation, Rijesh. And that brings us to the end of the episode and this segment.

We will finish off with our theme for next week, which, as many of you may have already guessed, it's your favorite translated novel. This time we're just doing books, okay? No more, no movies, no TV shows. Only books. But any language. So it doesn't necessarily have to be an Indian translation and an Indian language,

but that we'd really enjoy that. It could also be a novel from abroad by a foreign writer. We would love that. Yes. All right. That's a wrap. That's a wrap.