Bharti Airtel’s Vice-Chairman and Managing Director, Gopal Vittal, has called for the formation of an industry-wide platform to combat cyber fraud, urging telecom peers Reliance Jio, Vodafone Idea, and BSNL to collaborate under a Joint Telecom Fraud Initiative.
A Call for Unified Action
In a letter dated May 14, reviewed by Business Standard, Vittal urged India’s major telecom operators to come together to address the alarming rise in cybercrime, particularly frauds involving malicious URLs designed to trick users into disclosing sensitive financial information or making fraudulent payments.
This proposal comes at a time when the Indian government is tightening cybersecurity regulations amid growing geopolitical tensions, especially with Pakistan. Data from the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre (I4C) under the Ministry of Home Affairs reveals that India registered over 1.7 million cybercrime complaints in the first nine months of 2024, leading to losses exceeding ₹11,000 crore.
Vittal highlighted that fraudulent URLs account for nearly 50% of financial losses, while the remaining losses stem from phishing calls, scam messages, and other sophisticated digital frauds.
A Vision for Industry-Wide Collaboration
“Given this growing threat, we believe it is crucial for the industry to respond collectively. To that end, we propose a Joint Telecom Fraud Initiative, involving all telecom operators, to jointly prevent, detect, and mitigate scams across our networks,” Vittal wrote.
The proposed initiative would focus on:
- Real-time sharing of threat intelligence across networks.
- Coordinated blocking of suspicious numbers, devices, and SIMs.
- Standardised protocols and fraud detection mechanisms across the telecom ecosystem.
Vittal emphasised that joint action would close current gaps exploited by fraudsters, especially those arising from the lack of coordination between different telecom networks.
Standardisation and Regulatory Synergy
The initiative would aim to standardise technology frameworks, response strategies, and communication channels for fraud prevention. It would also improve coordination with regulators such as TRAI and DoT.
“Such collaboration would also be cost-effective, enabling operators to share tools, analytics, and threat intelligence, thus reducing redundancy and operational expenses,” Vittal added.
Scams in the country are just blowing up, and I know we don’t have time but it is always better to just double check everything – @iamRashmika, National Ambassador for Cybersecurity, speaking on the rise of online frauds.#AirtelTheSafeNetwork pic.twitter.com/njtrnucPR9
— airtel India (@airtelindia) May 16, 2025
Airtel’s Ongoing Fight Against Digital Fraud
Airtel has consistently advocated for industry-wide cooperation on digital security. Last year, the company proposed sharing corporate connection data among operators to fight unsolicited commercial communication (spam). Airtel also rolled out an AI-powered spam detection system, which has flagged over 27.5 billion calls as spam and actively blocks malicious links across SMS platforms and mobile browsers. If accepted, the Joint Telecom Fraud Initiative could become a landmark step toward unified industry action, bolstering the security of India’s rapidly expanding digital ecosystem.
