The government-mandated Calling Name Presentation (CNAP) service may identify who is calling, but it will not replace the broader context that consumers increasingly seek before answering a call, according to Truecaller. The caller-identification company believes its business model will remain relevant even as telecom operators begin displaying the KYC-registered name of callers on incoming calls.
“It is no more just about identity. People use Truecaller now more about the context of the call,” Priyam Bose, global head of go-to-market for Truecaller for Business, told Fe on the sidelines of Global Fintech Fest on Wednesday.
CNAP displays the name registered against a mobile connection’s KYC records. But that name may belong to the person who purchased the SIM and may not indicate who is actually making the call or the purpose of the call, Bose said.
For instance, a delivery agent calling a customer about a package could appear under an individual’s name rather than the name of the delivery company. Similarly, a driver calling to collect a vehicle for servicing may be identified only by the name linked to the SIM.
“He may not be a business, but he’s one of the employees of the business,” Bose said. “A name without a context makes it difficult for me to correlate.”
Truecaller, by contrast, uses information contributed and tagged by its user community to provide additional context around a number, including the business or organisation with which it is associated. This, Bose said, remains a key distinction even when telecom operators provide caller names directly through CNAP.
The distinction is particularly relevant for businesses that use employees, delivery personnel, drivers and other field staff to make calls from individual mobile connections. In such cases, the KYC-registered name may remain unchanged even though the number’s usage and association with a business can evolve over time.
Bose described KYC information as a largely static record, while the context around a phone number can change frequently.
“Identity is one part of it,” he said, adding that the information users need before answering a call increasingly extends to understanding whether the caller is legitimate, familiar or potentially unwanted.
The rollout of CNAP therefore does not necessarily make third-party caller-identification services redundant, according to Truecaller. Instead, the company sees the service as addressing the basic question of who owns the connection, while platforms such as Truecaller can continue to address the wider question of who is calling and why.
Bose also said Truecaller does not view CNAP as being at odds with its own services. “I don’t think we are on the different side. We are on the same side,” he said, describing the government’s intervention as a blessing that has brought greater seriousness to the issue of caller identification.