Pune: It seems even though everyone was at home during the lockdown with online transactions slowing down, cyber fraudsters were actively operating within Pune city. During the lockdown, the city reported 32 cybercrime cases on a daily.
Though the regular crime and accident rates have reduced drastically, the cybercrime cases are on a rise.
According to reports, in the first six months of this year, an average of 32 cybercrimes were being committed in the city every day. More than 62 per cent of these crimes were due to citizens sharing their one-time passwords (OTP) and pins with cyber thieves.
Most of the common modus operandi are under the guise of Paytm verification and KYC update. These cyber thieves also mainly target senior citizens and women by engaging them in talks, intimidating or threatening them of closing bank accounts for no usage in the last three months.
The fraudsters also send them links asking people to fill details. Globally, cyber fraud is known for cheating people of millions by fetching debit and credit card information.
The highest number of 2071 complaints have been received by the cyber police so far using debit and credit cards, while 517 complaints of money transfer without debit and credit cards have been received.
Banks and police have been alerting and repeatedly telling people not to share confidential numbers and OTPs with anyone, but 238 complaints of fraud have been received due to OTP sharing.
Also, 189 people have been cheated by the cloning of cards. 189 people have been cheated by the lure of jobs. Loans are another way of luring people and 176 cases have been registered.
As many as 583 people have been duped on the OLX portal. On the other hand, 415 people have been trapped by these cyber thieves for buying and selling online.
Additional 280 complaints of fraud have been lodged about fake accounts, as well as others defaming, objectionable uploaded on the social networking sites.
In view of the rising cybercrime in the city, an independent cyber police station has been set up in the city since July last year. Through it, citizens are constantly guided and appealed to not fall for these traps. However, there are still countless people who fall prey to the lure of cybercriminals.
In 2018, there were 5,500 complaints of cyber crimes in the city, which increased by 2,295 in 2019 and 7,795 cybercrimes were registered.
Cybercrime is on the rise in 2020. Before the end of the first six months of the year, there were already about 5,755 cybercrime complaints last year.
Jayaram Paygude, Senior Inspector of Police, Cyber Police said, "Neither the banks nor anyone is asking to update the KYC so if the citizens get any such SMS or phone call, they should not take it. Also, do not give them information about you or the bank."
Crime statistics
Debit, Credit Card Crimes - 2071
OTP shares - 238
Card cloning - 189
Fraud by job lure - 189
Fraud by OLX - 583
Online Buying and Selling Fraud - 415
Crimes through social media - 280
