Staff Reporter :
Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission Chairman Shahjahan Mahmood said free internate calling apps will come under guideline within two or three months.
BTRC is going to develop guideline for using these apps as these were responsible for the decline in international call termination via the legal channel, he added.
Replying to a question on the government’s stand on use of OTT (Over-the-Top) or communication apps, he said the government has no plan to restrict free calling and messaging apps Viber, WhatsApp, WeChat and Imo.
State Minister for Post and Telecommunications Tarana Halim has said recently at her ministry office that “The government has decided to frame guidelines to stop illegal call termination through VoIP … Communication apps will not be blocked … There is no question about it,”
These communication apps would continue operation as usual, she added.
Two years ago, the volume of daily incoming international voice calls was around 123 million minutes which currently came down to 70 to 80 million minutes, said the BTRC chief.
Not only illegal call termination through VoIP, but the extensive use of OTT [over-the-top] apps was also responsible for the decline in international call termination via the legal channel, he added.
Currently, there are six crore mobile internet users in the country and most of them use WhatsApp, Viber, WeChat and Imo for chatting, voice and video calls.
According to BTRC, the country is now registering 70-80 million minutes international calls a day. The volume of calls surged to 123 million minutes a day after reducing the call rate to 1.5 cents at the end of 2014 from 3 cents. But the volume of calls dropped again after increasing the call rate to 2 cents.
