The country's march towards a digital economy gathered pace in the last two years. At the same time, the country witnessed a jump in online payment frauds. Here's how we can protect ourselves online
The Reserve Bank of India in its annual report said that the Covid-19 pandemic fuelled the proliferation of digital modes of payments. As money grew on virtual platforms, so did the tech-savvy fraudsters. According to the National Crime Records Bureau, the cyber-crimes saw a surge of 12 percent last year. And just like the real world, the law enforcement agencies are on their toes to curb frauds in the virtual world too.
And if you thought that just the elderly and technically-challenged people fall prey to cyber frauds, then you are mistaken. Seasoned fraudsters who work full-time to cheat people have spared none. Let us see what methods these fraudsters adopt to swindle money.
As the maximum financial transactions take place through United Payments Interface or UPI, this platform witnesses the most attacks. The fraudsters use a basic feature of UPI apps called ‘collect request’ for cheating. The collect request feature on UPI apps lets you request others to pay you a specified amount.
This type of fraud is most prevalent on platforms like OLX, Quikr, and Telegram. Assume that you are a seller who just listed your phone for sale on OLX. The fraudster will call you to show interest in purchasing the phone. He may even insist on paying an advance even without taking a look at the product. And in the next step, he will send you a UPI collect request after taking your phone number or the UPI ID.
The scammer promises to transfer the money to you but instead sends a request demanding money. But the unsuspecting seller, thinking that it is a request to accept money, approves it following which money is debited from his account.
The most important thing to remember here is that receiving money via UPI takes no effort and you are not required to enter a PIN for that.
Sometimes the fraudster may also send you a collect request in the form of an image of a QR code and ask you to scan that in order to receive money. One need not even open the UPI app to receive money. If you receive such a money request, you can simply decline it.
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