Emotionally manipulating victims to gain trust and compliance from them, scammers these days liberally utilise the Internet and messaging apps to target individuals easily
Scams have this uncanny trend of sprouting up when least expected. But so persistent has been the barrage of rackets that has assailed the country over the past few years that it becomes difficult to actually understand the anatomy of such fraudulent acts and the frequency at which people are falling prey to such con games.
On second thoughts, it is as if the victims are playing into the hands of the swindlers or are willing themselves to be taken for a ride. How could one otherwise explain this folly repeating itself umpteen times with the severity of the rip-offs only assuming alarming proportions with every passing ‘phase’!
The con-artists seemingly have their fingers on the pulse and can manipulate situations to their advantage.
Online scams have given enough evidence of this.
It is assumed that it is the gullibility of the general public which contributes to the spate of online scams. However, it is not only the naivety but the greed shown by a majority of them to earn a quick buck that has many succumbing to the enticing ‘offers’.
Recent news reports indicate a rise in cyber frauds in the country. Methodically planned scams which have had even the most qualified professionals ensnared in cyber frauds of chilling sophistication have left officials from the investigating agencies clueless.
It is not that the nation has not been rocked earlier by scandals which exposed its susceptibility to financial frauds.
After the infamous 1992 Indian stock market manipulation scandal orchestrated by Harshad Mehta, the ‘Big Bull’, the Stamp Paper scam which came to light in 2003 and elevated the mastermind Abdul Karim Telgi to national notoriety have served to be sharp reminders of such embarrassments.
With their exposure and arrest, it was believed that scams of this magnitude would never be heard of again in India. But with technological advances, scamsters too have been bringing in an element of innovation and sophistication into their acts.
Ingenuous fraud schemes are being used to fleece people out of their hard-earned money. An article in ‘Linkedin’ graphically describes the various ways scammers employ to defraud their unsuspecting victims.
But it is generally observed that it is almost always the ‘promise’ factor that lures unwary ‘customers’ into their net.
E-commerce frauds are quite common nowadays with online shoppers being tempted to go in for seemingly attractive deals which appear to be too tantalising.
Besides the huge spike in social media scams targeting older people that has definitely been a matter of concern, the revelation that it is the educated who are falling preys to such deceptions makes matters all the more worse.
While the earlier scams were extremely vast in scale and too difficult to comprehend for the common man; the information that modern day scams often exploit people’s desire for quick wealth, fear of missing out, trust in authority figures, and vulnerabilities related to online privacy and social media, makes it amply clear that any and every one can easily fall prey to them.
Emotionally manipulating victims to gain trust and compliance from them, scammers these days liberally utilise the internet, social media, and messaging apps to reach a wide audience and target individuals easily.
Creating a sense of immediate need to act, often with limited-time offers or fake emergencies, the modus operandi in most cases, it is observed, follow much the same pattern.
As a type of cyber fraud where scammers impersonate officials from various organisations, including government agencies and law, to trick people into coughing up money, the very notion of ‘digital arrest’ is striking terror in the minds of people.
The audacity with which cybercriminals are adopting ‘techniques’ that seem to be keeping pace with the changing trends in the highly evolving global technological scenario, various extortion rackets are apparently assuming new guises with every passing hour.
Cyber security advisories warning people about cyber threats and how to protect themselves from cybercrime do not seem to have had the desired effect considering that there has hardly been any significant dip in the number of cyber frauds being reported.
At a time when the country’s rapid digitalisation has become a key driver of economic growth and social inclusion, are crimes evolving around the new development ‘index’ an indication of the ingenuity of the criminal elements that infest the country!
Would this mean that the criminals are brilliant enough to tap into the lacunae present in the digital system to envisage ways to con victims or is it just a matter of mastering the rudiments of the subject that allows for such massive cyber frauds!
It cannot be argued that the anonymity offered by the online world emboldens criminals to ply their trade without the fear of detection. The increased reliance on online systems has not helped matters either!
With the country’s digital thrust supposedly yielding rich benefits, it however becomes essential that the public is imparted adequate cybersecurity knowledge.
It is equally important that authorities assigned to tackle cybercrimes keep pace with the changing technologies.
Lest we forget, criminal progressions are a natural corollary of technological advancements.
(Pachu Menon is a senior columnist and author based in Goa.)
