New Delhi: The Central government has come down hard on websites which attracted ‘organised’ investment through task-based economic frauds and laundered the crime proceeds out of India.
The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said on Wednesday that 100 such websites have been blocked by Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY) on the recommendation of National Cybercrime Threat Analysis Unit (NCTAU), which is under MHA.
“NCTAU had last week identified and recommended over 100 websites involved in organised investment/task based part time job frauds. MeitY, invoking its powers under the Information Technology Act, 2000, has blocked these websites,” MHA said in a statement.
The ministry informed that these websites facilitated task based/organised illegal investment-related economic crimes, which were being operated by overseas players. The overseas people were allegedly using digital advertisement, chat messengers and mule/rented accounts for the same.
“It was also learnt that proceeds from the large-scale economic frauds were seen to be laundered out of India using card network, crypto currency, overseas ATM withdrawals and international fintech companies,” the ministry added.
These frauds came to light after multiple complaints were received through 1930 helpline and National Cybercrime Reporting Portal.
“These offences were posing significant threats to the citizens and also involved data security concerns,” the ministry stated.
Modus Operandi
It was found that the frauds were initiated through targeted digital advertisements on Google and Meta using key words like ‘Ghar baithe job (Jobs while sitting at home)’, ‘Ghar baithe kamai kaise karen (how to earn money while sitting at home)’ in multiple languages by overseas advertisers.
The targets were mostly retired employees, women and unemployed youth looking for part-time jobs.
Once a user clicks on the advertisement, an agent starts chatting with the potential victim through WhatsApp/Telegram. The agent tries to convince the victim to perform tasks like ‘video likes’ and subscribe. Once the task is completed, the victim is given a commission initially and asked to invest more to get higher returns against the work given.
“After gaining confidence, when the victim deposits a larger sum, deposits are frozen and thus victim is duped,” the statement said.
A cyber safe India is is one of the top priorities of MHA, said the statement.
“Union home minister Amit Shah is committed to curbing cybercrime and protecting people from cyber threat actors. Citizens are also advised to promptly report phone numbers and social media handles used by such fraudsters to the NCRP www.cybercrime.gov.in,” MHA said.
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