Obnoxious Communication Regulation Finally by PTA

To protect the interests and rights of telecommunication consumers from spam, unsolicited, fraudulent and obnoxious communication, the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority has published regulation draft and has asked industry concerns to comment on it.

Draft is available here for download

Subject to the approval of the Authority and feedback from industry, all Operators shall set up a procedure to ensure all possible technical measures are made available in a transparent and non-discriminatory manner to all subscribers to prevent Obnoxious Communication.

All Operators, within sixty (60) working days from the commencement of these regulations shall set up a round the clock complaint handling mechanism to prevent from Obnoxious Communication. The mechanism shall constitute the following measures to be adopted by all Operators:

• Recording of all telephone numbers including area code (where applicable) of a complainant;
• Telephone number and area code (where applicable) of the originator of the Obnoxious Communication;
• Issuance of warning immediately but not later than 24 hours of receipt of complaint and record the same in the grey list being maintained by the Operator;
• If originator persists after issuance of warning the Operator shall process termination of outgoing communication of the telephone subscription of the originator;
• All Operators shall maintain a black list for a period of six months of all telephone subscriptions terminated by the Operators for reasons of Obnoxious Communication.

All Operators shall setup a media campaign to educate subscribers of the available preventive and subsequent complaint mechanisms for handling Spamming, Unsolicited, Fraudulent and Obnoxious Communication.

The media campaign shall be advertised through print and electronic media or in consumer’s manual in accordance with regulation 17 of the consumer protection regulations, 2008 within sixty (60) working days from the date of commencement of these regulations.