News Roundup: New TRAI Chairman, RBI On Safer Online Transactions

 J.S. Sarma, a member of the Telecom Disputes Settlement And Appellate Tribunal, will likely be announced as the next chairman of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, Business Standard reports. Sarma was not among the 13 candidates who were originally shortlisted by the selection panel. BS columnist Sunil Jain had pointed out on Sunday the conflict of interest involved in Sarma becoming the head of TRAI. "First, it is curious that a person who has been sitting in judgement on TRAI should now be asked to head it. Some of these judgements have been so full of holes and so blatantly pro-government (see 'New-age yoga gurus at the TDSAT', April 6), the TRAI will want to contest them — how is that possible when the man who delivered them is to head TRAI? ***** India's central bank, the Reserve Bank of India, has asked banks to put in place a dual-factor authentication process for online transactions, reports The Economic Times. This will mean a second layer of security, either through a mobile-phone based verification process, or a password generator, in addition to the normal username-password combination. While safer transactions will provide a boost to ecommerce, if the process is seen to be too cumbersome, that will backfire, too. ***** India Today chairman Aroon Purie, who recently said he will not spend any more on digital media, has been named the chairman of the International Federation of the Periodical Press, exchange4media reports.  ***** Rajiv Jaitly has quit as president, marketing and sales, at DB Corp., publisher of Dainik Bhaskar, India's second largest read daily, shortly after completing a year at the firm, reports e4m. When we contacted Jaitly, he said he was moving back to telecom, but did not reveal which company he was joining.  Join ContentNext, along with Social Media and Mobile visionaries, for our third annual EconSM Conference in San Francisco on May 14th. Registration includes admission for our post-conference mixer. Register at www.econsm.com for the May 14th event in San Francisco. Get 10% off the the early registration fee by using code "EconSM0910"