New Delhi: Being aware of the fact that the incidents of cyber crime have been increasing in India, the Union Home Ministry has set up a high-level inter ministerial committee under the chairmanship of special secretary (internal security) to evolve strategy to stop such incidents.
"The high level committee will coordinate with relevant ministries and departments for implementing comprehensive measures aimed at mitigating cyber crime originating from South East Asia targeting India and creating a resilient ecosystem to prevent such crimes from originating from other geographies," said Rajesh Kumar, Chief Executive Officer of Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C).
As per government data, India registered a growth of 60.9 per cent of cyber crime trends between 2022 to 2023 with more than 7,000 cyber crime complaints being registered per day in May.
As many as 7,40,957 cyber crime complaints have been registered till May 2024 whereas 15,56,218 complaints have been registered in 2023. Similarly, 9,66,790 cases were registered in 2022 registering a growth of 113.7 per cent in comparison to the cases registered in 2021.
"This year we have been registering major scams like fake trending apps, investments apps & websites, loan apps, dating apps, gaming apps and algorithm manipulation," said Kumar.
The major scams in 2023 were investments apps & websites, loan apps, dating apps, gaming apps and algorithm manipulation and matrimony scams. "The cyber frauds are originating from scams centres in Southeast Asia like Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos etc," added Kumar.
According to Kumar, at least 10,000 FIRs have been registered since January this year under different categories of scams including digital arrest (4599), trading scam (20043), investment scam (62687) and romance dating scam (1725).
As per data, the fraudsters whisked away Rs 120,30,55,853 through digital arrest. Similarly, Rs 1420,48,33,765 have been whisked away through trading scam, Rs 222,58,19,236 through investment scam and Rs 13,23,09,142 whisked away through romance dating scam.
"Last year more than one lakh investment scams were reported in the country," said Kumar.
There is an increase in big ticket fraud also in 2024. As per data, a total of 6,00,453 complaints of big ticket fraud were registered this year where Rs 7061.51 crore have been whisked away by the fraudsters while agencies have been able to freeze Rs 812.72 crore.
"While using call spoofing, the fraudsters appear as CBI, RBI, NIA, ED, NCB as well as bank officials before the victims," Kumar said.
What has worried the investigative agencies is the fact that as many as 4,000 mule accounts are reported by the Citizen Financial Cyber Fraud Reporting and Management System (CFCFRMS) in the national cyber crime reporting portal.
"Mule accounts are those accounts which are used by fraudsters for financial transactions. In fact, the gang of racketeers easily lure people from the economically weaker section to use their current account," said Kumar.
The I4C with support from other agencies and banking institutions have freezed nearly 3.25 lakh mule accounts in the last four months whereas over 5.3 lakh SIM cards were also blocked. "As many as 3,401 social media accounts, websites, WhatsApp groups have also been blocked during the last four months," said Kumar.
He said that based on analysis of the data from National Cybercrime Reporting Portal (NCRP) of I4C various inputs received from states and Union Territories it was observed that there is a significant rise in the number of cyber crime incidents targeting India originating mainly from Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos.
"We are also engaged in collaborative efforts with various social media intermediaries (Google, Microsoft, Meta, among others) and central and state law enforcing agencies to tackle cyber crime threats originating from the Southeast Asian region," said Kumar.
He said that cyber crime operations based in these countries employ a comprehensive array of deceptive strategies, including recruitment efforts by exploiting social media to lure Indian youths with fake employment opportunities. These individuals are then compelled to engage in various cyber scams, often communicating via messaging platforms using Indian SIM cards to target Indian nationals," he added.
He said that on Monday at least 1,450 such youths, who were trapped by the cyber criminals were protesting for their return to India. “The Cambodian Police have detained 60 people and we are in touch with the authorities in Cambodia to bring them back,” said Kumar.
He said that till date 360 people have been brought back to India who were forced into such activities.
