Mumbai is facing a sharp rise in financial cyber crime, with nearly twenty thousand people falling victim since 2020. Losses have crossed more than two thousand crore rupees. Despite rules that protect customers, most banks have offered little or no reimbursement. This has left ordinary citizens including business owners and pensioners dealing with financial loss and slow action from institutions.
The scams use advanced tricks such as credit and debit card cloning, one time password interception, SIM swaps and ATM fraud. Data from the Maharashtra Cyber Cell shows that four thousand one hundred and thirty two formal complaints were recorded. These victims lost one hundred and sixty one crore rupees. Police managed to recover only four crore and eighty lakh rupees, which shows how difficult it is to trace these criminals.
Individual cases show the impact. Romaljit Kaur Makkar, a businesswoman from Sakinaka, lost two lakh fifty thousand rupees from her credit card on the third of April during a regular office meeting in Mumbai. The illegal transactions took place in Lucknow even though the card was with her. She believes her personal identification number may have been copied through hidden CCTV footage during earlier shopping.
In another case, Navneet Batra, a retired engineer aged sixty four from Borivli East, has faced constant pressure from bank recovery agents and legal notices since March twenty twenty three. Fraudsters used stolen card information to make four fake purchases worth one lakh ninety thousand rupees for herbal supplements from Bihar. He quickly informed Dahisar police and blocked his card, but his bank has still not reversed the amount.
The Reserve Bank of India states that customers have zero liability if they inform the bank within three days of discovering a fraud. If reported between the fourth and seventh day, the loss limit is between ten thousand and twenty five thousand rupees depending on the card limit. If there is proven negligence such as sharing a personal identification number or one time password then the customer must bear the loss until the fraud is reported. After that, the bank must cover further losses. Banks must credit the reversal within ten working days and close the dispute within ninety days.
Yashasvi Yadav of the Maharashtra Cyber Cell says these crimes often happen due to data leaks from companies and ATM skimming devices. Cybersecurity expert Ritesh Bhatia says blaming users for sharing one time passwords is wrong because many cases happen due to weak databases and poor security. “Banks, not customers, bear the onus of fortifying the entire payment infrastructure,” Bhatia said.
Former police commissioner D Sivanandhan said banks are responsible unless the customer has clearly shared confidential information. Cyber law expert Dr Prashant Mali criticised the lack of respect for the RBI zero liability rule and called for stronger know your customer checks, faster card blocking, better cooperation between agencies and strict action against banks that do not follow rules.
Mumbai’s rising cyber fraud and low recovery rate show the need for stronger systems to protect citizens and their savings.
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