Truecaller takes its scam intelligence to the open web as it looks beyond caller ID

After much than a decennary gathering a caller ID concern serving over 500 cardinal users, Truecaller is present taking the scam quality it gathered on the mode to the unfastened web, with nary app oregon sign-in required.

The Swedish institution connected Sunday launched Scam Checker, a caller web and Android work that lets users paste successful a suspicious telephone number, link, oregon connection to find retired if it’s fraudulent. To work, the work surfaces related reports from Truecaller’s community, ScamFeed. However, much elaborate accusation astir a telephone number, including the sanction associated with it, remains disposable lone done Truecaller’s existing service, which requires a sign-in.

The free-to-access instrumentality volition initially beryllium disposable successful India and is acceptable to grow to Latin America, the Middle East and Africa, and Southeast Asia, the institution said.

In summation to serving arsenic pb procreation for its app, the assemblage reports tin springiness Truecaller a amended presumption of the scams circulating astatine a fixed time. This could besides assistance the institution with its fraud and hazard products sold to enterprises done Truecaller for Business, though Jhunjhunwala said Scam Checker itself is aimed astatine consumers.

To work, Truecaller’s Scam Checker checks the nexus the idiosyncratic submits, expanding shortened URLs and pursuing redirects to the last destination. It past checks these against its proprietary hazard database and different fraud signals. Users tin besides paste a suspicious message, allowing the work to prime retired a telephone fig oregon nexus and aboveground related reports from the Truecaller community.

Truecaller’s scam checkerImage Credits:Truecaller

The motorboat comes arsenic scams person grown good beyond telephone calls to substance messages, messaging apps, and web links. In a 2025 GSMA survey of Indian adults (PDF), 46% of those who reported being scammed said they were approached done messaging apps, portion 37% via SMS and 32% done dependable calls.

Truecaller estimates that radical marque astir 14 cardinal web searches a period to cheque suspicious links and telephone numbers, based connected its investigation of hunt volumes and postulation to existing verification services. That behaviour helped signifier Scam Checker, CEO Rishit Jhunjhunwala told TechCrunch.

“When you request it, you’re usually determination else. The nexus shows up connected WhatsApp. Your mum gets a connection astir a postulation fine. A person forwards you a screenshot and asks, ‘Is this real?’” Jhunjhunwala said. “What radical bash successful that infinitesimal is search.”

Truecaller’s assemblage is becoming a important portion of its scam-detection effort. The institution told TechCrunch that astir 20,000 scam reports are unrecorded connected ScamFeed, its crowdsourced provender wherever users tin station and sermon scams, successful India, with astir 1,300 caller reports added each week. Between September 14 and 20, the institution besides said it evaluated 12.9 cardinal messages globally and flagged 20.3 cardinal arsenic fraudulent.

In the adjacent future, Truecaller says it plans to broaden the types of scams Scam Checker tin observe and adhd screenshot uploads for further analysis.

The company’s propulsion beyond caller ID comes arsenic its halfway concern faces caller pressures successful India, its largest marketplace with much than 350 cardinal users. Telecom operators are rolling retired the national government-backed Calling Name Presentation service, portion Apple and Google person added their ain caller recognition and spam-protection features. Last week, India’s telecom regulator besides ordered caller-ID apps to stock user-submitted spam reports with telecom operators, a determination Truecaller criticized arsenic a “one-way exchange.”

As a result, Truecaller’s absorption is evolving beyond caller ID.

“Caller ID was the archetypal occupation we solved, and it’s inactive however astir radical find us,” helium said. “But scams moved to a much multi-channel attack with links and messages, and progressively to dependable and video. Our extortion has to travel the scammer.”