iWorld
MPL launches #SaveOurMissingGirls campaign, teams up with Missing Link Trust for a role play game
Mumbai: Mobile and skill gaming platform (MPL), in collaboration with Missing Link Trust, has launched a campaign called #SaveOurMissingGirls to raise awareness about human trafficking. The campaign was announced on the eve of the United Nations’ World Day against Trafficking in persons. It aims to spread awareness of the dark world of human trafficking through a role-playing game.
As a part of this week-long campaign starting on 30 July, MPL has invited people to take a pledge by giving a missed call to the number 9099306000 and show their support towards ending this menace that impacts millions of lives every year.
Human trafficking is the second largest organised crime in the world and the numbers are alarmingly increasing across the world and in India. According to a Dasra report, nearly 1827 women are trafficked every hour on an average in India, resulting in almost 16 million women being victims of sex trafficking every year. 40 per cent of these victims are adolescents and children.
The UN’s theme this year for World Day Against Human Trafficking is ‘use and abuse of technology’ in human trafficking, and MPL has chosen gamification as the technology-led path to sensitise the general public and potential victims about human trafficking and ways to prevent it.
Missing, developed by Missing Link Trust, an NGO which combines art and technology to create mass awareness around sex trafficking, was onboarded on MPL recently. The interactive game, wherein the gamer assumes the role of a trafficked girl in India, is designed to allow players to experience what a missing person goes through when she is trafficked into the inhumane and cruel world of prostitution, a world into which millions of girls are lost every year. Gamers have to make smart choices at each step of the game to be able to get out of the trap set by traffickers.
MPL country head for India Namratha Swamy said, “Technology has a big role to play in the prevention of human trafficking, and we believe online gaming can be an interesting way to sensitise people and raise awareness about eradicating human trafficking. One of the key objectives of the #SaveOurMissingGirls campaign is to use games to make more people alert. We have received an overwhelming response from MPL’s users to Missing ever since its launch on our platform.”
“The Missing game comes under the genre of ‘Games for Change’ by tackling the first ‘P for Prevention’ of the United Nation’s four Ps against trafficking. We think this campaign, along with our collaboration with the MPL platform, with a strong 90 million, will be a game-changer in ensuring a wide reach for the game and making millions of people aware of the menace,” said Missing Link Trust founder Leena Kejriwal.
Several celebrities and influencers such as Durjoy Datta, Ravinder Singh, and Trendulkar have extended their support to the campaign by joining the conversation on social media. NGOs like CyberPeace Foundation, Impulse, and Digital Empowerment Foundation, among others, also supported the initiative to show their solidarity towards the cause.
iWorld
Telcos push for unified rules as spam shifts to OTT platforms
Over 80 per cent fraud moves online, operators seek common framework.
MUMBAI: The spam may have left your phone network but it hasn’t left you alone. India’s telecom operators are once again dialling up the pressure for a unified regulatory framework, warning that fraud is rapidly migrating to internet-based platforms where oversight remains far looser. According to industry communication, a leading operator has written to multiple arms of the government including the Department of Telecommunications, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology and the Ministry of Finance arguing that tighter controls on traditional telecom networks are inadvertently pushing bad actors towards over-the-top (OTT) communication platforms.
The concern is not new, but the framing has sharpened. What was once an industry grievance is now being positioned as a consumer protection issue. Operators say that tackling spam in silos no longer works, as fraudsters seamlessly shift across platforms, exploiting regulatory gaps. The result: a moving target that traditional safeguards struggle to contain.
Executives point to a clear shift in fraud patterns. OTT platforms are increasingly being used for phishing links, impersonation scams and bulk unsolicited messaging, with industry estimates suggesting that over 80 per cent of spam activity has now migrated online. In this environment, the lines between telecom networks, messaging apps and financial fraud are blurring fast.
At the heart of the industry’s demand is a call for a technology-neutral regulatory framework, one that applies consistently across telecom and internet-based communication services. Operators argue that the absence of uniform safeguards, such as sender verification systems, robust spam filters and clearly defined accountability mechanisms, has created enforcement blind spots that fraudsters are quick to exploit.
The proposal is straightforward but far-reaching. Telcos are pushing for baseline anti-fraud measures across all communication platforms, alongside faster response systems and deeper coordination between ministries. Given the interconnected nature of telecom networks, digital platforms and financial systems, they argue that fragmented oversight only weakens the overall defence.
The broader issue is regulatory arbitrage, the ability of bad actors to hop between platforms based on which is least regulated at any given time. Without harmonised rules, operators say, efforts to curb fraud risk becoming a game of whack-a-mole.
As digital communication continues to expand, the debate is shifting from who regulates what to how consistently it is regulated. For now, telecom operators are making their case clear: in a world where spam travels freely, regulation cannot afford to stay fragmented.
