Indians Robbed Of Rs 615 Crore Via Debit/Credit Card Frauds In Last 10 Years; More Than 1 Lakh Cases Of Sub-Rs 1 Lakh Scam Revealed

No one is safe from the Cyber fraud! Not even you!

Since the dawn and fame of the Internet, cyber thieves and hackers have invented new ways to rob people to gain easy money or other sensitive information.

According to reports coming in from Reserve Bank of India (RBI) fraudsters have drained Rs 615.39 crore in more than 1.17 lakh cases of credit and debit card frauds over 10 years (April 2009 to September 2019).

Increase in Internet Fraud Cases!

According to the Right-To-Information (RTI) reports, the total number of credit/debit card fraud cases reported to RBI by 100 varied banks in eight years (April 2009 to April 2017) stood at 6,785 cases, and the amount lost was ?243.95 crore.

The Central Bank did not keep a record of cybercrimes amounting to less than ?1 lakh between April 2009 and April 2017. Hence as per the bank’s reply to a RTI query, the amount is expected to be much higher.

However, after RBI started tracking frauds amounting to less than Rs1 lakh from April 2017, the number shot up. In just 2 ½ years (between April 2017 and September 2019), a total of 1,10,367 cases amounting to ?371.44 crore were reported.

Why is the Amount so High?

In a survey conducted by OLX in February 2020, in which 7,500 people took part, it was found that 52% of the respondents publicly shared their phone numbers and personal addresses online. 26% of them shared one-time passwords (OTP) with others! Around 22% admitted to sharing bank account, UPI (Unified Payments Interface), credit or debit card PIN details.

Police officers and cyber experts are encouraging the citizens to be more alert in their dealings on the internet. The Maharashtra Cyber Department  believes that financial institutions and banks need to do a lot more to tighten their security system to control the increasing cyber frauds.

Dr Balsing Rajput, superintendent of the department, said,” Till the banks come up with advanced technology to secure their systems, fraud cases will continue unabated. We are coordinating with telecom service providers and other service providers, including banks, to nab the accused.”

Solutions by Experts to Make Transaction Secure!

Shomiron Das Gupta, an intrusion analyst who has been building threat-detection systems for more than a decade and founder of DNIF (a platform that offers cyber-security solutions), told Hindustan Times, “In cases where cloned cards are used by fraudsters to withdraw money from ATMs, the banks can come up with the OTP system, where after swiping your card, an OTP request is received on your mobile and this OTP is mandatory to withdraw money. This way, even if the fraudster has your cloned card and PIN, he cannot withdraw money.” 

Gupta added, “If this option is not possible, then another option to stop such frauds would be where the user can scan a unique QR code on the ATM. As soon as it is done, the user can withdraw cash. We have technology to shift to a card-less economy.” Thus the use of cards or any contact with ATM is eliminated making the transactions safe.

Vicky Shah, a cyber-law advocate, advises card monitoring which can help curb frauds to a great extent. Shah said, “All banks do not carry out ‘card-transaction monitoring’ that can help prevent such frauds. For example, if a customer usually withdraws or transacts ?2,000 to ?5,000 and suddenly, ?25,000 or more is getting withdrawn/transacted multiple times, it should come to the notice of the bank, which should then make a verification call to the customer before approving the transaction. Another example of transaction monitoring is if one usually uses the card in Mumbai and then one day, the card is being used in another state/country.” 

Additionally Shah stated, “Banks are not following the RBI Consumer Protection Circular released in 2017, in which they have to give one, a dedicated toll-free customer care number; two, a dedicated email-id and three, the toll-free number must have a representative for immediate response to fraudulent transactions.”

According to Shah, presently, interactive voice response (IVR) chargeable to customers is used by banks, which consumes around 15 minutes to register a complaint and block the card, which gives enough time to the  fraudsters to make more transactions. Customer data gets leaked from banks (third-party agency), which too is a major issue of concern.