Updated: March 29, 2023 11:16 AM IST 
Mumbai: The covid pandemic has significantly increased the usage of online payment in India. Though the massive shift to cashless money transfers using unified payment interface (UPI) apps is still recent, it hasn’t stopped con artists from devising inventive ways to defraud people using well-known mobile payment apps. According to the Reserve Bank of India, the daily transactions hosted by UPI have crossed from 24 crore to 36 crore in February 2022.
According to various media reports, fraudsters are using a new pitch called, “payment mistake” to scam people. These fraudsters, by taking advantage of people’s ignorance, were able to steal Rs 1 crore from 81 people in Mumbai.
The UPI scam is said to be a sophisticated mix of malware phishing and human engineering, making it challenging to protect against. Existing anti-malware software may not be sufficient to safeguard mobile payment application users from this online fraud.
The scammers are allegedly sending money to individuals using their UPI applications, such as Google Pay, and then calling them to claim that the transfer was made in error.
The mystery caller then asks for individuals to return the money to their phone number. When someone sends the money back, though, the con artists hack into their UPI account and take money straight out of their bank account.
If the victim uses the UPI app to pay back the money, malware infects the victim’s smartphone, allowing the con artist access to all of their data, including bank account information and KYC (Know Your Customer) information like PAN and Aadhaar.
With this knowledge, the con artist may access the victim’s bank account and cause further damage.
According to renowned Delhi-based cybercrime expert Pavan Duggal, this method of operation is a sophisticated blend of malware phishing and social engineering. He emphasized the difficulty of this by saying, “This is a mix of malware phishing plus human engineering, so existing anti-malware software may not be sufficient to protect Mobile payment application users from this online fraud.” He advises users to respond to such calls by informing the con artist that they have informed their bank of the problem.
“With reference to recent media/social media articles on ‘KYC scams’ – The connection to UPI is misleading and incorrect. We assure all users that any payment through UPI does not expose the sender’s KYC details and neither does it lead to a user’s mobile or App getting hacked. UPI works on the principle of payment using a Virtual Payment address or UPI ID – using secure method of device binding and UPI PIN to transfer money. KYC details are not used or shared during a UPI transaction. We would like to reassure that UPI continues to remain a safe and secure payment method. The intention of some of these articles/ social media messages are to mislead and thereby create mistrust about a payment method that has been adopted widely across the country.”
To stay safe, it is essential to remain vigilant and take appropriate measures to protect yourself from potential fraud. Here are some of the ways though which a person can protect himself from getting scammed.
NOTE: According to a report by the union finance ministry, cyber cells recorded more than 95,000 fraud cases of UPI transactions between 2022-23.
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