Govt Plans Mobile Number Verification for Apps, Banks

The telecommunications department has proposed sweeping new cybersecurity rules that would require digital platforms to verify customer mobile numbers through a government-run system, as the country grapples with rising online fraud.

- Sejal Sharma

NEW DELHI:

The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) unveiled draft amendments dated Tuesday that would establish a Mobile Number Validation (MNV) platform to check whether phone numbers provided by users actually belong to them—a move that could affect millions of Indians using everything from food delivery apps to digital payment services.

India has over 1.16 billion mobile connections and is the world's largest market for digital payments, making it a major target for mobile-based fraud schemes.

The proposed rules target what the government calls Telecommunication Identifier User Entities (TIUEs)—essentially any business that uses mobile numbers to identify customers or deliver services, beyond licensed telecom operators.

"A person, other than a licensee or authorized entity, which uses telecommunication identifiers for the identification of its customers or users, or for provisioning and delivery of services," the notification states.