Suppose your phone rings and on the other side is an officer from CBI. The officer charges you to be part of a massive drug chain and a consignment or parcel is about to reach your home, which the officer needs to seize. You deny your involvement in any such illegal activity, but the officer asks you to follow him. The officer further suggests that you constantly remain on video conferencing through Skype or any other platform to be under his surveillance.
This situation typically makes up a new form of cybercrime called a ‘digital arrest’. The situation of a digital arrest involves a fraudster calling you by the name of an officer from the CBI, FBI, ED, TRAI, etc. The fraudster then approaches the intended target using audio or visual calls. The first step is to intimidate people and the second step is to extort money from them while confiding them to one location physically, usually the victim’s own house. This creates a situation of false pretence of an arrest in a digital form, and hence the cybercrime is called a ‘digital arrest’.
Digital Arrest Frauds in India
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in the first quarter of the year 2024, highlighted that India has lost approximately Rs.120.30 crores in digital arrest frauds. According to the data from the Ministry of Home Affairs, digital arrests have become a prevalent method of digital fraud lately. The ministry also monitors the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre.
The base for many such frauds comes out to be Southeast Asian countries, like Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia. Approximately 46% of cyber frauds reported between January to April this year were from these three countries. The total value of money lost by victims can be estimated to be touching Rs.1,776 crores.
Data from the national cybercrime reporting portal also showed that Rs. 7.4 lakh complaints were made between January to April while Rs.15.56 lakh complaints were received in 2023. A year before in 2022, Rs.9.66 lakh complaints were reported, which was higher than the figure of Rs.4.52 lakh complaints reported in 2021. These trends point towards the growing magnitude of cyber arrests in India.
The targets for these crimes are chosen very carefully and would be contacted over Skype or other video calling platforms, which can secure the identity of the caller. According to the Cyber Fraud Mitigation Centre situated in New Delhi (also called 14 C), there are four categories of digital scams. These include digital arrests, trading scams, investment scams, and romance scams. The daily newspaper Indian Express reported the official court of the chief executive officer of 14C, Rajesh Kumar, who revealed the surprising figure of money lost in all the scams,
“We found that Indians lost Rs.120.30 Cr in digital arrests, Rs. 1,420.48 Cr in trading scams, Rs. 222.58 Cr in investment scams and Rs. 13.23C in Romance scams.”
“The cybercrime operations based in these countries employ a comprehensive array of strategies, including recruitment efforts by exploiting social media to lure Indians with fake employment opportunities.” Kumar added further.
Security from Digital Crime
The space for physical and mechanical mobility has been taken up by the digital world. This has increased the ambit of digital platforms. Everything from rural benefit transfers to Aadhaar cards has been digitised. It then becomes important to ensure personal security.
This can be done by using strong passwords and multi-factor authentication in all your bank accounts and digital devices. It can come out to be less convenient for personal use, but given the increasing cybercrime, this is the only way out. In case of theft or data breach, always keep a backup of your personal data so that you can erase everything from a device whenever you want. An active virus plan can further add to the security wall of your device.
Being the victim of a cybercrime should not be taken as a fault of the victim because these crimes are planned in an organized manner. The targets are carefully selected, and the fraudsters have a lot of practice to use different methods of intimidation. Hence one can go beyond judging a victim and reporting immediately to the cyber security cell without hesitation or delay.
