Airtel Proposes Joint Telecom Fraud Initiative with Jio and Vi, Leveraging AI to Combat Rising Cybercrime in India

Airtel Said to Have Approached Jio, Vi for Joint Initiative Against Fraud

The joint initiative is said to focus on phishing and URL-based scams Airtel has reportedly approached Reliance Jio and Vodafone Idea (Vi) to propose a joint initiative against fraud and scams. As per the report, Airtel has informed the government, as well as the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), about approaching the two major telecom service providers. The company reportedly highlighted the rising instances of online scams and fraud in India in the previous year as the reason behind taking a proactive measure. Notably, Airtel recently introduced an artificial intelligence (AI) fraud detection solution for communication platforms and apps. According to a PTI report, Airtel wrote separate letters to the telecom operators and flagged the exponential rise of cybercrimes. Citing data, it reportedly mentioned that the country registered more than 1.7 million cybercrime complaints in the first nine months of 2024. The cumulative financial losses from these reported crimes are said to be more than Rs. 11,000 crore. Airtel's letter to Telecom Secretary Neeraj Mittal and TRAI Chairman Anil Kumar Lahoti reported mentions that the "alarming" rise in the specific types of scams, such as phishing and URL-based scams, has led to the company asking for an industry-wide action against threat actors. "These sophisticated fraud schemes often exploit the gaps in coordination between service providers," the telecom operator was quoted as saying. Notably, in phishing scams, cybercriminals impersonate people familiar to the victim or members of a credible institution to lure them into revealing sensitive information such as passwords and bank details. Similarly, in URL-based scams, scammers trick individuals into opening and sharing sensitive information with malicious or fraudulent web links that appear to be genuine. In the letter, Airtel reportedly also mentioned that it approached all telecom service providers in October 2024 to take collaborative action against the issue of unsolicited commercial communications (UCC). That proposal is said to have included actionable items such as mutually sharing details of corporate connections used to make marketing calls in a standardised format. In May, Airtel announced the implementation of a multi-tier intelligence platform that uses AI to detect malicious websites. When a user tries to open such as website that has already been flagged by the telecom operator's system, the page loading process in blocked and instead, users are redirected to a page that details the potential threat.

Airtel Calls For Joint Industry Action On Telecom Fraud

Bharti Airtel has urged its market competitor Reliance Jio to join forces to curb the "menace" of telecom fraud, according to a letter seen by MediaNama. The telecom giant also sent letters to the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) and the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) informing them of the same. As per the Hindu Business Line, Airtel sent a similar communication to Vodafone Idea. For context, Airtel had proposed last year that telecom companies should launch a joint initiative to "tackle unsolicited commercial communications (UCC)" through corporate connections' data sharing. If the big three telecom companies decide to work together against telecom scams and fraud, with the support of the Government authorities, the problem can potentially be resolved expeditiously. Airtel, while citing the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre (I4C) data, said that India recorded over 1.7 million cybercrime complaints in the first nine months of 2024, resulting in financial losses exceeding Rs 11,000 crore. "A major contributor to this has been brand abuse, where cybercriminals impersonate trusted entities to mislead consumers into divulging sensitive information or making financial transactions. The use of fraudulent URLs to perpetrate these scams, accounts for nearly half of all financial losses," the telecom giant pointed out in its latest letter to Reliance Jio. Airtel further added that the real threat telecom service providers (TSPs) need to deal with is the growing spread of deceptive and malicious URL links that scammers employ to target vulnerable individuals. These messages entice users into clicking on URLs that redirect to phishing websites, fake loan offers, or fraudulent payment pages, which mislead users into sharing personal, financial, or security-sensitive information. Since such threats are growing, Airtel believes that the telecom industry must come together to respond in a unified manner. "In this spirit, we propose the creation of a Joint Telecom Fraud Initiative, comprising of all Telecom Service Providers, to work together to prevent, detect, and mitigate potential fraud and scam flowing through our networks," Airtel says in the letter. According to Airtel, such an initiative would enable: Airtel had proposed last year that TSPs should share details of corporate connections being used for commercial calling in a standardised format. This would aid the TSPs to proactively monitor for spam and mitigate potential misuse. Furthermore, Airtel had also proposed a centralised data-sharing platform to address the issue of UCC. In September 2024, the Indian telecom giant launched its network-based, Artificial Intelligence (AI)-powered spam detection solution to alert customers in real-time. This system detects spam calls and SMS by analysing several parameters like the caller/message sender's usage pattern, call/SMS frequency, and call duration. In addition, the spam detector cross-references the information against known spam patterns to alert users about suspected spam. Along with AI and machine learning-enabled features, a joint effort from the Government bodies and industry players would go a long way in protecting the vulnerable from telecom fraud and scams. In this context, a joint initiative between three of India's telecom giants to share information and data could help users protect themselves better from fraudulent callers and spammers, regardless of the TSP they have subscribed to. Notably, Airtel's AI-powered spam detection feature has been able to make some progress in this regard. In December 2024, the telecom giant revealed that this particular feature has been able to detect 8 billion spam calls and 800 million SMS messages since September 2024. Additionally, the company was able to alert 252 million unique customers about suspicious calls. This led to a 12% fall in response to such calls, Airtel claimed. In October 2024, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) announced that it was also planning to roll out an AI-based spam detection system that would help in neutralising and eliminating scams before they reach its subscribers.

Airtel reportedly calls on Jio, Vi to unite against rising telecom scams: Here's what we know

Airtel has deployed AI tools to block phishing threats and calls. Airtel has reached out to Reliance Jio and Vodafone Idea, urging them to join a new telecom scam initiative to curb the rising digital scams, cyber fraud, spam, and phishing attacks. In formal letters to the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) and the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), the telecom company has cited that over 1.7 million cybercrime complaints were filed in the first nine months of 2024, with financial losses of over Rs 11,000 crore. The company has asked its rivals to collaboratively fight against the growing threat of malicious scams targeting individuals. Scammers use sophisticated tricks, like fake loan offers and phishing links, to deceive users and steal their personal and financial information. These scams are mainly carried out via messaging and social media apps like WhatsApp, Telegram, Facebook, and Instagram. Airtel has already taken independent steps by deploying AI-powered fraud detection systems that can scan and block malicious URLs and phishing websites across channels. It said that the initiative needs unified cooperation from telecom networks to prevent users from phishing scams. Also read: Vivo X200 FE launch timeline, price, camera, specifications and everything else we know The new joint initiative will provide real-time fraud intelligence sharing and cross-network coordination among all telecom service providers (TSPs). "Fraudsters are exploiting the lack of coordination between networks. We need to work together to protect our users," Airtel said in its letter. Last year, in October 2024, Airtel suggested that all telecom providers share information about commercial calls through a centralized system, similar to the Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) platform. Meanwhile, Airtel's Vice Chairman and MD Gopal Vittal is also expected to reach out to customers directly via messages and emails to warn them against the new wave of scams. He said that this scam looks pretty promising, making customers click on the phishing link. Once clicked, the users may end up losing all their money, said the telco.