With the launch of the digital consent acquisition (DCA) pilot project, select bank customers will shortly begin receiving SMS alerts from their telecom service-providers (TSPs) via the short code 127000. This will enable them to review, manage and revoke previously granted consents for promotional calls and messages to banks. Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has announced the start of SMS notifications under the DCA pilot, a joint initiative with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) aimed at digitising, standardising, and modernising consent for promotional communications.
The pilot marks the first operational step in testing a unified digital consent platform that nine telecom operators and 11 major banks have been integrating with over recent months. Participating banks include: State Bank of India (SBI), Punjab National Bank (PNB), Axis Bank, Bank of Maharashtra, Canara Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, IndusInd Bank, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, Indian Overseas Bank and Punjab & Sind Bank. These institutions have begun uploading sample sets of legacy consents—permissions often obtained years ago through paper forms or in-branch digital systems—onto the centralised platform created for the trial.
Under existing rules in the Telecom Commercial Communications Customer Preference Regulations (TCCCPR) 2018, consumers may block promotional messages by category or selectively allow communications from specific businesses. However, implementation has been hampered by the absence of a standardised system to upload and validate older consents. As a result, users have had no easy way to see what promotional consents they had previously given, nor a reliable mechanism to revoke them.
TRAI says the DCA pilot aims to resolve these long-standing gaps by providing a single, secure digital interface where customers can view and manage their existing consents. The SMS messages now being sent to a small subset of users are part of system testing to verify technical readiness across TSPs, banks and the consent registry.
Only customers whose legacy consents have been uploaded by banks will receive the messages at this stage; others do not need to be concerned if they do not receive any communication during the pilot phase, TRAI says.
Each SMS will contain a standard advisory and a secure link directing the customer to the authorised consent management page of their TSP. From there, users can view the consents recorded against their mobile number by the participating banks and decide whether to continue, modify, or revoke them. No financial or personal information will be requested and users are advised to act only on messages originating from the official short code 127000. Responding to the SMS is optional, though any customer wishing to update their consent preferences can do so through the linked portal.
TRAI emphasised that the pilot is limited in scope and intended to validate performance before a larger national rollout. Once fully deployed, the DCA platform is expected to bring transparency, customer control, and greater accountability in the way businesses seek and use consent for promotional communications.
How This Helps Common Users
The DCA pilot stands to significantly improve daily user experience in several ways:
1. Control over Unwanted Promotional Messages
Users can finally see all the promotional consents linked to their mobile number, including years-old permissions they may have forgotten about. This lets them instantly revoke or modify what they no longer want.
2. Transparency in Consent Collection
Instead of opaque, paper-based consent processes, customers will have access to a clear, standardised digital record of who is authorised to send them promotional messages.
3. Protection against Misuse of Old Consents
Legacy consents taken at bank branches or through outdated forms have long been exploited for repeated promotional messaging. The new system allows users to audit and cancel them directly.
4. Reduced Spam Over Time
By giving users the ability to prune unnecessary consents, the pilot—and eventual national rollout—should help reduce spam calls and SMS from legitimate sources that rely on outdated permissions.
5. Secure, Verified Communication
Messages only from the official 127000 short code reduce the risk of phishing or fraudulent links pretending to be consent-related communications.
Overall, the DCA pilot empowers mobile subscribers by putting them—not banks, businesses, or telecom operators—in charge of which promotional messages they receive.
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