Latest news with #DoT
Time of India
6 hours ago
- Time of India
DoT's Sanchar Saathi traces over 20 lakh lost, stolen phones: MoS Telecom
The telecom department 's Sanchar Saathi platform has helped in tracing over 20 lakh lost or stolen phones till date, Minister of State for Telecommunications Chandra Sekhar Pemmasani said on Friday. According to data available on the Sanchar Saathi platform, the government has been able to block 33.5 lakh mobile phones and traced 20.28 lakh handsets till date. "DoT's Sanchar Saathi application has enabled reporting and blocking of fraudulent mobile connections and helped trace over 20 lakh lost or stolen phones. We remain committed to building a secure and citizen-centric digital ecosystem," Pemmasani said on a social media platform after holding a review meeting on fraud prevention efforts by the Department of Telecom. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Affordable 2-Bed Senior Apartments In California (Take A Peek Inside) Articleresource24 Undo According to sources present in the meeting, the minister was informed that the average recovery rate of lost mobile phones is 22.9 per cent, and 4.64 lakh handsets have been returned to the citizens till date. Sanchar Sathi platform enables citizens to report their lost or stolen mobile phones for blocking and recovering them, file complaints against fraudulent calls and report fraudulent connections issued in the name of individuals.
Mint
8 hours ago
- Business
- Mint
Jio, Bharti-backed OneWeb get breather as India extends deadline for provisional spectrum use
Jatin Grover Satellite internet providers, including OneWeb and Jio, received a six-month extension to meet compliances for trial spectrum usage. Why this comes as a relief for the operators? Bharti Enterprises-backed OneWeb, Jio get extra time due to trial spectrum window extension. (Image: Pexel) Gift this article The government has given satellite internet companies, Bharti Enterprises-backed Eutelsat OneWeb and Jio Satellite, another six months to use provisional spectrum, two officials aware of the matter said. The extension gives them time until November to complete all security-related compliance requirements. The government has given satellite internet companies, Bharti Enterprises-backed Eutelsat OneWeb and Jio Satellite, another six months to use provisional spectrum, two officials aware of the matter said. The extension gives them time until November to complete all security-related compliance requirements. This comes as a relief for the operators that were yet to comply with the government's recently introduced security guidelines, a prerequisite for launching commercial services in India, one of the two officials cited above said. The extension will give companies time to meet mandatory security compliance requirements while the government finalises satellite spectrum pricing and other conditions for commercial rollout, the official said, adding that national security safeguards are essential before services can go live. The official said the service launch could be delayed if the companies are unable to meet the required standards. The provisional spectrum was opened to the companies in October by the department of telecommunications (DoT) through a notification at a one-time fee of ₹ 1.1 lakh for a six-month period. The spectrum was issued for testing services as well as to attain security compliances, and was not meant for commercial services. 'The companies have not been able to fully meet all the security assurance requirements. Therefore, they have been given the extension," the second official said, adding that OneWeb was the first to seek spectrum usage extension as it has met almost 80% of the security requirements of DoT and is in the process of meeting the remaining requirements. On 16 May, Mint reported that Eutelsat OneWeb has sought more time from the Centre to meet all of India's stringent security norms and the government might extend the timeline for use of the provisional spectrum. Jio too had asked the government later for extension of the trial spectrum, the second official added. Queries emailed to OneWeb India, Jio, and DoT early Friday did not elicit any response till press time. "There is no spectrum allocation policy, which has come out yet. So, DoT had to extend the timeline for provisional spectrum for the companies as new use cases of the technology are also coming up," an industry executive said OneWeb was the first satellite communications (satcom) company to receive the global mobile personal communication by satellite (GMPCS) licence from the DoT in April 2022, allowing it to offer satellite-based services in India. Jio Platforms, an arm of Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), which plans to roll out its consumer satellite broadband service under the 'JioSpaceFiber' brand, has a joint venture with satellite operator SES. Unlike OneWeb, which uses a constellation of 630 low-earth orbit (LEO) satellites, Jio's service is based on six medium-earth orbit (MEO) satellites. The differing technologies mean the complexity of security compliance also varies for each operator. Security compliances 'India has stringent security regulations, and since this is the first time operators are going through the entire process - including trials, audits and demonstrations, it will take some time to achieve full compliance. Early movers like OneWeb and Jio-SES seem to have a headstart here," said Shivaji Chatterjee, chief executive and managing director of Hughes Communications India, which distributes GEO and LEO satellite services in the country. GEO is geostationary earth orbit satellites, while LEO is low earth orbit. "It's not that the operators' systems are not ready to demonstrate security compliance. Some of the requirements are complex to demonstrate, and being a first time, varying interpretations by audit agencies and operators have led to longer approval times," he added. On 5 May, DoT issued guidelines to tighten security as satellite communication companies such as Starlink, Amazon's Kuiper, Globalstar, OneWeb and Jio move closer to starting satellite internet services in the country. Starlink received its licence from DoT on 6 June to begin satellite broadband services in India. After the spectrum allocation, the company will need to test and demonstrate compliance with the security conditions, like its peers. Companies seeking a global mobile personal communication by satellite (GMPCS) licence in India would require security clearance for specific gateway or hub locations in the country, per the department of telecommunications' guidelines. Among the 29 requirements, the government has also mandated data localisation, lawful interception, and local manufacturing requirements for satcom companies. A key challenge with compliance is the mandate to set up network control and monitoring centres within India, giving India control over satellite telemetry–on-ground management and monitoring of satellites based on transmitted data, one of the officials said. Indian authorities require that telemetry and control of satellites serving Indian users be done within the country to ensure national security and data sovereignty. Also Read: Eye in the sky: India to set up satellites to spy on satellites Spectrum allocation draft Currently, DoT is also in the process of finalising the spectrum allocation via non-auction route and other modalities to pave the way for operators to start satellite internet services in the country. On 9 May, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) had recommended administrative allocation of spectrum, as opposed to auctions, for satellite internet services. It said satcom companies will have to pay annual spectrum charges of either 4% of their adjusted gross revenue (AGR) or ₹ 3,500 per MHz, whichever is higher. Additionally, Trai has recommended an additional annual charge of ₹ 500 per subscriber for such service providers in urban areas. Satcom operators will also have to pay the government an annual licence fee of 8% of AGR, per the current authorization terms of the DoT. Telecom operators, represented by the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), alleged that the pricing for satellite spectrum recommended by the telecom regulator is unjustifiably low, non-transparent, and does not lead to a level playing field. It said the recommendation of spectrum usage charges—set at 4% of adjusted gross revenue—without any entry fee or upfront payment is inconsistent with the approach followed so far in case of administrative spectrum allocations, and is without any rationale, empirical analysis, international benchmarking or economic justification. However, the Broadband India Forum (BIF), which represents Big Tech and satellite companies, wrote to the Centre on 18 June that there was no question of a level playing field, given the vast differences in technologies, services, infrastructure costs, and spectrum assignment methods. It urged the Centre not to review Trai's recommendations. Topics You May Be Interested In
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Business Standard
a day ago
- Business
- Business Standard
IIT Madras, STL launch multi-core fibre testbed at TTDF Symposium
Indian Institute of Technology Madras and optical solutions major STL Technologies have jointly launched a new multi-core fibre (MCF) testbed, with the aim of advancing India's optical communication infrastructure. The facility was inaugurated at the Telecom Technology Development Fund (TTDF) Symposium held by the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) at the IIT Madras Research Park in Chennai. The infrastructure includes both underground (4.07 km) and aerial (1.20 km) cable installations. The cables incorporate 12 multi-core fibres (four cores each) alongside 12 standard single-mode fibres, and will be open to both academic and industry partners. Essentially a research and development (R&D) platform for testing the capabilities of optical fibres in a controlled environment, the testbed will be used to assess use cases and test component interoperability within the MCF ecosystem, the DoT said in a statement. Speaking at the inaugural session, Telecom Secretary Neeraj Mittal said India was at a critical juncture in its innovation journey and stressed the need for collaboration and optimal utilisation of the country's resources. He also announced plans for a dedicated portal to facilitate such collaboration. Launched in 2022, TTDF is a government initiative that supports R&D in next-generation telecom technologies, particularly those aimed at bridging the digital divide in rural and remote areas. It has received over 1,300 proposals for R&D funding since its inception. So far, 120 projects have been approved with over ₹500 crore in funding, and more than ₹187 crore has already been disbursed to beneficiaries, including academic institutions, micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), and startups, the DoT said. Implemented by Digital Bharat Nidhi, TTDF aims to reduce reliance on telecom imports, promote indigenous manufacturing and develop intellectual property in the sector. The TTDF Symposium 2025 was organised to provide a platform for funding beneficiaries to discuss synergies and potential pathways to advance their research and development. The event brought together academics, startups and industry representatives involved in the programme.
Time of India
2 days ago
- Politics
- Time of India
Telecom department warns employees against using political influence for service related matters
New Delhi: The Department of Telecom has warned its employees against using political or external influence for service related matters, according to an office memorandum issued on Wednesday. The memorandum said that reference from Member of Parliaments or any other dignitaries will be presumed that it has been sought by the employees and the matter will be dealt as per service rules. "It has been observed that some government servants are attempting to influence service-related decisions, particularly transfers and postings , by soliciting political or external support, including through relatives or wards. This is a violation of Rule 20 of the CCS (Conduct) Rules , 1964, which expressly prohibits bringing or attempting to bring political or outside influence in such matters," the memorandum said. The memorandum reminded employees of the government's decisions under Rule 20. A first-time violation invites formal advice, a second breach results in a written warning to be placed on record and further violations call for disciplinary proceedings under the CCS (CCA) Rules, 1965. "All ITS officers are hereby advised to refrain from any such practice and not to bring political and other outside influence directly or through their relative/ wards to further their service matters particularly in the matter of transfers/ posting," the memorandum said. DoT has advised employees to seek redressal through prescribed official channels only. "Any instance of violation of these rules/ orders would be viewed very seriously and the officers/officials responsible for such violation would attract strict disciplinary action," the memorandum said.
Indian Express
2 days ago
- Business
- Indian Express
From AI agents to cloud telephony, Zoom executives discuss company's next act
Zoom wants to be much more than a video chat platform. It is taking on Google and Microsoft in enterprise software by shipping productivity tools such as Zoom Documents, Zoom Team Chat, Zoom Whiteboard, etc. It has also rolled out Zoom AI Companion and is integrating AI into all levels of its product suite. Zoom is also looking to strengthen its foothold in India by expanding its cloud-based enterprise telephony service called Zoom Phone to four additional licenced service areas across the country. The company further launched Contact Center here that enables customers to reach out to Zoom's enterprise clients through a wide range of channels, including voice, video, virtual agents, social media, email, and messaging apps. Security is central to everything Zoom does, Steve Rafferty, head of APAC and EMEA at Zoom, told in an exclusive interaction in New Delhi last week. Echoing this, Sameer Raje, the general manager and head of India & SAARC region at Zoom, highlighted the company's federated approach to AI that empowers its customers with greater control, privacy, and choice. Here are the edited excerpts from the interview: Zoom became a household name during the COVID-19 pandemic. Since then, it has pivoted to becoming more than a video conferencing platform. How does Zoom Phone and launching Zoom Contact Center in India further that vision? Steve: If you think of Zoom as a business communications platform, then video and meetings was the first element of that. Lots of organisations enter from different pivots. So we were meetings first, and now we've got chat, Contact Center, Phone, Clips, Documents, and so much more. We're trying to give our customers and partners one place to meet effectively, whether that's message, video, or phone. Whether it's internal communication or messaging externally with customers or suppliers, Zoom will give you that unified platform experience. That was always the plan. We just started with meetings. You mentioned that getting Zoom Phone regulatory compliant in India was an elaborate process. What were some of the terms and conditions involved in the DoT authorisation? Also, what do you think needs to change in terms of the eligibility conditions for cloud-based telephony services? Sameer: Authorisation is basically the license. It's the UL access BMO license which we took in all the six telecom circles [Mumbai, Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, and Delhi-NCR]. And each of the circles have their own requirements as well as technical call flow, approvals, so on and so forth. It's not as simple as building it once for one telecom circle and having it work everywhere. Logically, yes, the product might be the same but each circle requires its own set of regulatory approvals. When you have a global product, the DoT requirements are very stringent. For instance, all equipment must be certified by DoT. There are specific certification programmes and you cannot just use any hardware. From the hardware to the call flows, we had to change some of the elements of the product to make it compliant within the country. Hence, it was time consuming. Not only that, each telecom circle needs to be connected not only to the Zoom cloud but also to local telcos across the region and country. That includes setting up incoming and outgoing interconnections, which is a complex and time-consuming process. But that doesn't mean that you cannot use Zoom Phone anywhere outside these circles. Right now, these six circles are where you can procure the license from, but you can travel anywhere and accept calls and make calls to anywhere in the country. It's been more than a year since Zoom Workplace was introduced. How's the response been from enterprise clients compared to everyday users in terms of adoption and overall experience? How much of that has translated to sales? Steve: It's been very strong across all of our regions, especially internationally. What we're seeing now is different entry points for customers. Some customers may come in to start from a Contact Center journey because they've got a particular customer requirement, and we fix that. Then they'll adopt Zoom Phone or messaging. The workforce is changing at the moment. We're seeing a lot younger, more diverse workforce come in, and they've really taken to the Zoom platform because you can communicate by chat, you can pick up the phone, you can send a clip, you can join a work meeting, engage with customers, and so on. There's so many different angles to procure information. We've got control of so much data. A business can take that data and deliver better experiences to their customers. Have you noticed differences in how AI features are being adopted across specific use cases like customer support, live translation, meeting summaries, etc? Steve: There's two sides to that. There's the internal day-to-day job, and there's how you communicate with customers. We were with a customer last week at a sports shop. What they want is a specific chatbot for their clients, and they also want to be able to escalate that call really quickly to a human depending on the requirements. So if somebody wants to procure a tennis shoe, it is dead easy to handle. But if somebody wants bespoke running shoes, that's a specialist treatment. That's what we're seeing from a customer perspective. Zoom Workplace allows you to move those conversations around. Sameer: I'll add one critical point to that. We include Zoom Workplace in our license at no extra cost. Any other platform or AI engine may charge $20-$30 per user and the CEO or senior leadership may go for it thinking its the in thing. But are they really going to be that productive? Or does it make more sense to spend that $30 at the lower level so that the support agent can be more productive using AI on Zoom? They should be utilising AI where it makes better sense. It could be customer support or sales. Zoom Workplace can be rolled out across the organisation. One of the other areas that has been very positive to me is having all of that in one location. All the integrations on Zoom Workplace makes life so much easier and gives us hours back every week. While LLMs (large language models) can be quite convincing, trust is still a barrier to enterprise adoption. How do you solve for that? Steve: Security has to be at the heart of everything you do, whether it's AI or whether it's a basic implementation of any technology. We work with our customers, from CISO all the way down, to make sure that the data they're exposing is the correct data. We work with a security bank because you've seen from some of our competitors, how they've exposed people's salaries all the way through a business. We start with the security first? What's the outcome you're looking for, and how can we give you a secure outcome? And then the platform gets deployed based on that. What do you think about the role of AI agents on your platform, especially in automating enterprise workflows? Do you see them evolving into a meaningful revenue stream? Steve: It's about complementing the human workforce. It's not about replacing them. You've seen a lot of press with some organisations saying 'we're going to slim down our workforce. We're going to stick AI agents out there', and then it's difficult. What we do is, is, we speed up that journey for the customer. If you think about booking flights on air travel, for instance, we can pretty much run that whole system through a virtual agent. Sameer: If you look at our AI Companion, it's been embedded in a couple of products that we've introduced like Zoom Whiteboard where you can draw a circle and the AI will actually make it into a perfect circle. Zoom Workflows is also in beta right now. Beyond that, we also introduced Custom AI. Let's say you're in a pharmaceutical industry and you're using a particular terminology. You want the AI model to use that terminology, right? So it allows you to create your own language within that. What is Zoom's approach to AI development? Sameer: We have a federated model. This means we use our own LLMs as well as other industry-standard LLMs (OpenAI and Anthropic's models). That's how we shift between low-cost and high-cost GPUs. We also permit customers to bring their elements to a certain extent. That's a chargeable service. We are helping organisations break down their silos and improvise employee experience. We're quite happy for the customer to work where they want, and we support them with all of our tools and our AI and and our platform underneath. It's quite a different model to others. We've also made a commitment that we won't use customer data to train our models. But you're also in competition with these big tech companies, right? Most of their AI services seem to be bundled into their office suites. Steve: Yes but we don't walk into a Google or a Microsoft customer and say, 'What a terrible decision. You need to rip it all out. Stick Zoom in.' We go: 'Congratulations on your decision. Now, let's make sure you get the best value for money'. Not everything that's bundled works, and you're seeing how those bundles consistently change. What we allow you to do is to take the best video platform and plug it in, as well as the best phone platform if you want to use it. We've got Contact Center that you can plug in to make your Google or Microsoft Office environment sing much better.
