Context

• A west Bengal Court recently sentenced Nine People to Life Imprisonment for involvement in a Digital Arrest scam.
• This is among the first such case of Conviction in Country related to Digital Arrest.

About Digital Arrest

• Digital Arrest is a new and innovative tactic employed by cybercriminals to defraud gullible victims and extort money.

Modus Operandi

• The modus operandi in this cybercrime method is that fraudsters pose as law enforcement officials such as police, Enforcement Directorate, CBI, among others, and manipulate them into believing that they have committed some serious crime.
• In certain cases, the victims are “digitally arrested”, and forced to stay visible over Skype or other video conferencing platforms to the criminals until their demands are met.
• The cyber fraudsters deceive the victim into believing that he or she has been put under ‘digital arrest’ and will be prosecuted if they do not pay the scamsters a huge amount of money.
• The cyber criminals often force the naive victims to self-arrest or self-quarantine themselves, by tricking them into believing that they have been put under ‘digital arrest’ and cannot leave their house unless they pay up.

Impact on Victims

• This has left the victims of Digital Arrest break financially, emotionally as they experience a feeling of captivity.
• Some of the victims have been financially wiped out and others have lost all their cash as they have lost their life savings.
• Under the psychological pressure, the victims are convinced they are engaged in lawful criminal actions and must adhere to the criminals’ instructions not to be arrested.

Prevention and Awareness

• Verify the Caller: In any case you must try to identify the caller and then call the local police department or any other governmental institution.
• Do Not Share Personal Information: In regard to detail section and privacy, never provide any details related to personal or even financial character through the phone or targeted video number with an unidentified person.
• Report Suspicious Calls: In case a person feels that it is a fake call they should promptly report it to the local police or cybercrime department.
• Stay Informed: Be familiar with the current scams and fraud practices that can be used by potential threats.

Steps by Government 

• The Ministry of Home Affairs has set up the ‘Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre’ (I4C) as an attached office to deal with all types of cybercrimes in the country, in a coordinated and comprehensive manner.
• The Central Government has launched a comprehensive awareness programme on digital arrest scams which, inter-alia, include; newspaper advertisement, announcement in Delhi Metros, use of social media influencers to create special posts, campaign through Prasar Bharti and electronic media, special programme on Aakashvani and participated in Raahgiri Function.
• I4C proactively identified and blocked more than 1700 Skype IDs and 59,000 Whatsapp accounts used for Digital Arrest.
• The Central Government has published a Press Release on Alert against incidents of ‘Blackmail’ and ‘Digital Arrest’ by Cyber Criminals Impersonating State/UT Police, NCB, CBI, RBI and other Law Enforcement Agencies.
• The Central Government and Telecom Service Providers (TSPs) have devised a system to identify and block incoming international spoofed calls displaying Indian mobile numbers that appear to be originating within India.