New Delhi, Aug. 23 -- The government has dropped its plan to build a single, shared database - called the Biometric Identity Verification System (BIVS) - that would have assigned a unique ID to every user and allowed telecom companies to cross-check customer identity records across the industry. The decision represents the central change in the Telecommunications (User Identification) Rules, 2026, notified by the department of telecommunications (DoT) on August 21. Under section 3(7) of the Telecommunications Act, 2023, an entity must identify subscribers through verifiable biometric-based identification. With BIVS scrapped, cross-industry biometric matching will not take place, and verification will instead be conducted through e-KYC and D...