In a move aimed at easing compliance for Non-Resident Indians (NRIs), the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has relaxed the geo-tagging requirement mandating clients to be physically present in India while completing re-KYC through digital modes.
The regulator amended norms through a circular issued on Wednesday, following multiple representations from stakeholders seeking simpler and more accessible processes for NRIs. “The requirement of physical location of client being in India during digital on boarding shall be relaxed for undertaking re-KYC for existing clients,” the circular said.
Under the revised framework, NRIs can now complete their periodic re-KYC digitally from overseas locations. While the physical presence requirement has been removed specifically for re-KYC, SEBI has retained safeguards such as random action prompts, time-stamping, and geo-location tagging to ensure authenticity of digital interactions.
SEBI circular stated that the KYC application shall have features of random action initiation for client response to establish that the interactions are not pre-recorded.
SEBI circular said, intermediaries must also ensure that the GPS coordinates captured during the process match the country details provided in the client’s proof of address, and that their systems can block connections from spoofed IP addresses.
As per market participants Re-KYC process was very cumbersome because the NRIs had to come to India physically for Re-KYC purpose it was not only a costly affair but also a very time consuming.
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