Airtel announces new features in its continued fight against SPAM
- Expands coverage to international calls and SMSes
- Introduces SPAM alert display in vernacular languages
New Delhi, April 21, 2025: Following the launch of its AI powered spam detection tool that flagged over 27.5 Billion calls as SPAM to its customers, Airtel today announced the introduction of two significant enhancements aimed at staying ahead of spammers.
Customers will now receive SPAM alerts for calls and SMS messages in their preferred Indian languages. This new feature will be available in nine vernacular languages, with plans to add more in the future. Airtel’s AI-powered tool will now screen and alert customers to all SPAM calls and SMSes originating from international networks.
Once Airtel intensified its efforts to combat domestic spam calls, scamsters and spammers resorted to exploiting foreign networks to funnel fraudulent calls into India. This alarming trend resulted in a 12% increase in overseas spam calls in the last six months. Airtel expects to nullify this growing challenge with its new feature.
Commenting on the initiative, Siddharth Sharma, Director Marketing and CEO Connected Homes, Bharti Airtel, said: “Customers and their feedback are at the heart of everything we do. After carefully analysing customer feedback, we have enhanced our solutions to better serve the linguistic diversity of India. Additionally, with the growing volume of SPAM traffic shifting to foreign networks, we have decided to expand our AI-powered tool to scan all SMS messages and phone calls originating from international numbers. Our dedicated team of engineers and data scientists will continue to refine and enhance our offerings, ensuring we stay ahead of any and all emerging threats.”
The upgraded AI-driven SPAM solution will now notify users about calls and messages from both domestic and international numbers in ten Indian languages, including Hindi, Marathi, Bengali, Gujarati, Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam, Urdu, Punjabi and Telugu. SPAM alert notifications using vernacular languages are only accessible to customers using Android devices. All these features continue to be free for customers and will get auto-activated for all Airtel customers without them having to raise a service request.
Pictorial Representation
Airtel’s innovative, industry-first anti-SPAM tool, launched in September 2024, has been a game-changer for its customers, providing substantial relief from unwanted communications. According to Airtel, it has identified 27.5 billion calls until date, which translates to an impressive 1560 spam calls every second. Since its launch in September 2024, Airtel customers have also seen a 16% decrease in SPAM calls.
About Bharti Airtel Limited:
Headquartered in India, Airtel is a global communications solutions provider with over 550 million customers in 15 countries across India and Africa. The company also has its presence in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka through its associate entities. The company ranks amongst the top three mobile operators globally and its networks cover over two billion people. Airtel is India’s largest integrated communications solutions provider and the second largest mobile operator in Africa. Airtel’s retail portfolio includes high-speed 4G/5G mobile broadband, Airtel Xstream Fiber that promises speeds up to 1 Gbps with convergence across linear and on-demand entertainment, streaming services spanning music and video, digital payments and financial services. For enterprise customers, Airtel offers a gamut of solutions that includes secure connectivity, cloud and data centre services, cyber security, IoT, Ad Tech and cloud based communication. Within our diversified portfolio, we offer passive infrastructure services through our subsidiary Indus Tower Ltd. For more details visit www.airtel.com