Government Blocks Seven Million Phone Numbers Due to Fears of Online Payment Fraud

Financial Services Secretary Vivek Joshi stated on Tuesday that the Indian government has taken steps to stop digital payment fraud by banning an astounding 70 lakh cellphone phones linked to questionable transactions.

Following a meeting devoted to discussing financial cybersecurity and the rise in digital payment fraud, a decision was made. Joshi underlined that banks must strengthen their procedures and systems in order to meet these difficulties. In addition, he made arrangements for further discussions on this topic, the next of which is scheduled for January.

States have been asked to look into Aadhaar Enabled Payment System (AEPS) fraud and make sure that strict data security procedures are in place. Standardizing the Know Your Customer (KYC) procedures for retailers was another topic of debate.

The Financial Services Secretary led the conference, which focused mostly on ways to improve agency-to-agency collaboration in the fight against cybercrime. Joshi emphasized the need to increase public knowledge of cybercrime in order to prevent gullible consumers from being victims of dishonest business activities.

The most recent data on digital payment fraud was provided by the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre and came from the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal (NCRP). The talk provided an understanding of the difficulties in thwarting these fraudulent actions.

The meeting is important, especially in light of recent digital fraud incidents involving UCO Bank and Bank of Baroda. Senior officials from the Department of Economic Affairs, Department of Revenue, Department of Telecom, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, and National Payments Corporation of India are in attendance.

Incident at UCO Bank:

An incorrect credit of Rs 820 crore was reported to account holders by UCO Bank, a public sector institution with headquarters in Kolkata, earlier this month via the Immediate Payment Service (IMPS).

The bank discovered IMPS technical issues between November 10 and November 13. As a consequence, several transactions made by account holders from other banks resulted in false credits in UCO Bank accounts even though there was no real money transfer.

Without the need for middlemen, IMPS functions as a real-time interbank electronic money transfer system.

By swiftly blocking the receivers’ accounts, the bank was able to retrieve Rs 649 crore, or almost 79% of the total cash that was mistakenly credited.

UCO Bank has reported the issue to law enforcement organizations for the required investigations and actions, even though the bank has not yet disclosed whether the technological problem was the consequence of human error or a hacking effort.