SUMMARY
Truecaller said to comply with all data privacy laws in India
The caller identification app recently opened its first office in India, which happens to be the biggest one after its Sweden headquarters
The company also launched AI powered fraud identification service through SMS
After launching the AI powered SMS services in India, Truecaller has crossed the 250 Mn active users milestone in the country. Commenting on the user reach, CEO and cofounder Alan Mamedi said that there is a good scope for growth in India.
According to an Outlook report, Mamedi said that the company will comply with the data protection laws of India and “welcomes any and all actions in the mission to make communication safe and efficient.”
Commenting on the data privacy aspect, Mamedi stated that Truecaller is already privacy-focussed company with a permission-based system for required accesses. Talking about localising data, he furthered that the Indian data have been localised five years back by the company.
Last year, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that India will soon have a new privacy protection bill that will be comprehensive enough to address all the issues about data privacy.
Data privacy has been a matter of concern for the government due to rapid digitisation. Recently, furniture renting app Rentomojo suffered a major data breach following which the app notified that personal data of over 1 Lakh users have been stolen.
Further, the caller identification software company has launched its first India office at Bengaluru recently. Mamedi said, “We met our teams here and also discussed the upcoming projects and recent launches which we recently announced in public.”
Truecaller has also been active in product innovation in India. Last year, in December it launched a digital government directory that enables Indians to access all necessary verified government contacts. This facility will allow users to access certain helplines such as that of embassies, educational institutions, hospitals and key departments of 23 states, and all the information is government verified.
The Bengaluru office of Truecaller can accommodate up to 250 employees and is the largest establishment of Truecaller outside of its headquarters in Stockholm, Sweden. It was inaugurated in March by Minister of State Rajeev Chandrasekhar.
On the occasion of the office’s inauguration, Mamedi said, “This facility is a reaffirmation of our continued investment in India. We want to continue to serve India’s digital society and economy with the best experience on our app with safety and privacy as core operating principles.”
Last year, Truecaller saw a 15% year-on-year (YoY) in global monthly active users (MAU) where India continued to be its biggest market with a 14% YoY growth during the April-June quarter to 235.5 Mn.
