
On Monday, the Lok Sabha was informed that over Rs 1,000 crore has been safeguarded from more than 400,000 incidents of cybercrime through the Citizen Financial Cyber Fraud Reporting and Management System.
Minister of State for Finance, Bhagwat Karad, stated, “As per information received from the Ministry of Home Affairs, the Citizen Financial Cyber Fraud Reporting and Management System has been activated for immediate reporting of financial fraud and to prevent fund siphoning by fraudsters. Up to December 4, an amount exceeding Rs 1,000 crore has been saved in over four lakh incidents.”
In response to an inquiry regarding agencies investigating UCO Bank accounts, the minister added that by December 7, UCO Bank had recovered Rs 705.31 crore out of the Rs 820 crore initially reported as erroneously transferred. UCO Bank, which fell victim to a significant digital fraud, also filed an FIR with the Central Bureau of Investigation on November 11 concerning the transfer and deposit of Rs 820 crore to a different account from UCO Bank.
Karad further disclosed that a meeting was convened by the Department of Financial Services on November 28 to address issues related to cybersecurity in the financial services sector and the increasing incidents of recent online financial frauds.
“The meeting was attended by representatives from various ministries and departments, Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, Unique Identification Authority of India, Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre, National Payments Corporation of India, Banks, etc.,” he said.
The meeting assessed the readiness of banks and other financial institutions in dealing with challenges arising from cybersecurity in the financial services sector, the growing trend of digital payment frauds, and deliberated on a focused approach to mitigate such cyber-attacks and frauds.