New Delhi: Stock trading frauds topped the list of scams in terms of cyber scams worth Rs 11,333 crore registered lost in India in 2024. Ironically, the loss due to digital fraud also surpasses the government of India’s allocation of Rs 10,300 crore for the IndiaAI Mission for the fiscal year 2024-25. The allocation made in March 2024 is part of the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology’s (MeitY) budget of Rs 21,936.90 crore for the year.
The budget is intended to accelerate digital transformation and improve the country’s technological infrastructure. With Rs 4,636 crore lost in stock trading scams and registration of 2,28,094 complaints, investment-related scams come second which costs victims Rs 3,216 crore from 1,00,360 cases.
According to the data provided by the Citizen Financial Cyber Fraud Reporting and Management System (CFCFRMS), nearly 12 lakh cyber scam complaints were received this year, with a majority of them (45 per cent) coming from Cambodia, Myanmar, and Laos.
An in-depth analysis of the fraud cases revealed that stolen funds are often withdrawn through methods such as cheques, central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), fintech crypto platforms, ATMs, merchant payments and e-wallets.
To deal with the complex subject of financial fraud, the government set up CFCFRMS in 2021 creating a common integrated platform where all stakeholders concerned, including Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs), banks, RBI, financial intermediaries, payment wallets and NPCI work in tandem; to ensure that quick decisive and system-based effective action is taken to prevent the flow of money siphoned off from innocent citizens to the fraudsters.
“The Citizen Financial Cyber Frauds Reporting and Management System has been developed for quick reporting of financial cyber frauds and monetary losses suffered due to use of digital banking/credit/debit cards, payment intermediaries and UPI,” said Dr Deepak Kumar, a senior official from I4C.
The CFCFRMS comes under the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) of the Home Ministry. The I4C provides a framework and ecosystem for law enforcement agencies to deal with cybercrime in a coordinated and comprehensive manner. According to government data, India registered more than 14,41,717 cybercrime cases across the country this year.
“The cases involve the most trending cyber scams, including investment scams, part-time job scams, instant loans, digital arrest, dating scams, refund scams, fake gaming apps, cyber slavery, sextortion and money transferred by mistake among others,” Kumar said. So far, a financial amount of more than Rs 3,431 crore has also been saved in more than 9.94 lakh complaints by the CFCFRMS.
The I4C has imparted cyber hygiene training to 7,330 officials of various ministries and departments of the Government of India. The I4C has imparted cyber hygiene training to more than 40,151 NCC cadets and by November 15, more than 6.69 lakhs SIM cards and 1,32,000 IMEIs as reported by police authorities have been blocked by the Government of India.
