
Ask HN: Is it legal to use Twilio/Plivo within India - loneranger_11x
Context: Want to setup a telephony solution for an Indian business with Indian customers. Would preferrably want a cloud solution with API access like Twilio.
But AFAIK Indian regulations prohibit VoIP to PSTN telephony in India. So have regulations changed or Twilio&#x2F;Plivo have found a way to stay compliant?
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telebone_man
The ITU provides the answers you need, in various forms. But captured well
here -
[https://www.itu.int/ITU-D/treg/VoIP.pdf](https://www.itu.int/ITU-D/treg/VoIP.pdf)
where it says...

"In India, VoIP is allowed, but only for computer-to-computer communications.
India deregulated IP Telephony on 1 April 2002 following the ITUís World
Telecommunication Policy Forum held in 2001 on the topic of ì IP Telephonyî.
Indiaís proposed unified licence regime, however, would impose no restriction
on VoIP telephony or other IP-enabled services, provided they are offered by
operators with a unified licence that have duly paid all required registration
charges."

..In practice, this means Twilio can terminate a call into India, as long as
the route the call takes is via a licensed operator. This is Twilio's problem,
not yours. (unless it says otherwise in their terms).

It also means if an individual, physically within India, chooses to make an
outbound call, over the Twilio service, then the endpoint has to be another
IP-endpoint. Or if to a 'copper cable endpoint', then at least traverse over
an appropriate Indian carrier at some point. Probably using some kind of PSTN-
IP gateway. Again, Twilio's problem and not yours (unless it says otherwise in
their terms).

These complications were introduced to prevent people in India setting up
copper cable-IP gateways, taking advantage of cheaper retail call bundles, and
selling them cheap on the wholesale market. Naughty!

Personally, I would contact Twilio. They won't be able to give legal advice,
but they will at least tell you if they can legally facilitate the
requirement.

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loneranger_11x
Thanks for the summary!

> as long as the route the call takes is via a licensed operator. This is
> Twilio's problem, not yours.

I surmised as much. Have not been able to speak to Twilio. But Plivo's reps
assure me that compliance is not an issue. But we want to be doubly sure. Do
not want to be railroaded by legality somewhere down the line

