Beware, fraudsters can scam you via e-wallets

Beware, fraudsters can scam you via e-wallets

PUNE: The Union government is pushing hard for cashless economy and e-wallets. But whether monetary transactions via e-wallets are safe is the big question with so many frauds coming to the fore every day. 

A 62-year-old woman who was cheated to the tune of Rs 1 lakh lodged a complaint with Kondhwa police on Friday. The complainant was approached by the unknown fraudster who lured her by offering a lucrative job. The fraudster asked the woman to transfer the amount through Paytm. The woman did as instructed by the fraudster but did not get any job. 

Similarly, 27-year-old Naval Baheti, who was planning to buy an iPhone through an online shopping website, was recently cheated to the tune of Rs 37,000 by an online fraudster. Naval saw an advertisement of an iPhone for Rs 43,000 and was interested in the deal. He contacted the seller who shared his PayTm number with him. The online seller told Naval that he is sending the iPhone through courier and shared the courier details with him. Naval was asked to pay Rs 18,000 after the seller shared the courier details. The seller again called up Naval and told him the mobile phone has been dispatched to his address and asked him to deposit another Rs 19,000 in PayTm account of the courier person. Naval did as instructed but was not aware that he is falling into a trap and never received the iPhone. 

With the rise in a number of such crimes, the Reserve Bank of India directed the mobile wallet companies to complete the ‘Know Your Customer’ (KYC) norms of the users so that those misusing such e-wallets can be tracked. 

However, cyber experts feel that people need to outsmart fraudsters and only making KYC mandatory will not help. Cyber expert Chirayu Mahajan of ANA Cyber Forensic said that many of the mobile wallet companies are yet to complete the KYC procedure as per the RBI norms. “Though KYC will help in establishing a link with fraudster it is not necessary that fraudsters would not commit such crimes. Many such crimes take place via social engineering. The fraudster will lure you and phish your mobile wallet data before cheating you and so you must be aware,” added Mahajan. 

Another cyber expert Anil Raj of Cybervault Security Solutions Limited said mobile wallets have indeed pulled their socks and are getting the KYC done along with connecting the mobile wallet with the Aadhaar data. “The process might help to reduce such frauds but it cannot be stopped. Moreover, there can be other vulnerabilities in the online payment system of mobile wallets which can be explored by fraudster before committing a crime,” added Raj.

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