A year after a cyber police station was set up in each of the city’s 15 police districts, Delhi Police data showed that 1,516 people have been arrested so far for cybercrimes, with South East seeing the most FIRs registered at 165 and North topping in terms of cases solved with 54.
Amid rising instances of cybercrimes, cyber police stations were set up on December 1, 2021, following a gazette notification by the Home Department of Delhi government in November of that year.
Over 1,400 FIRs
As per the data, in the one year that cyber police stations have been operational, 1,477 FIRs have been filed and 548 cases have been solved.
After South East, the most cybercrime FIRs registered in any district was 160 in Shahdara, followed by 139 in West.
In terms of number of cases solved, the runner-up district after North was Rohini with 53, followed by South with 52.
Most common cases
The mostly commonly solved cases at these police stations were those of email and social media fraud, data theft, ransomware, ATM and credit card fraud, insurance scam, lottery scam, sextortion, Chinese loan app scam and electricity bill fraud.
An officer said that in cases where child pornography or online harassment of a child is reported, the police is mandated to process the complaint and get in touch with the victim and SIM provider within 24 hours. “If there is insufficient evidence to register FIRs, action-taken report is mandatory to be filed within 14 days,” he added.
Another officer said that most complainants are women and minors. “Complaints have increased post-COVID. Sextortion and financial frauds have increased because people resorted to easy money and the internet is accessible to many people. In most of these frauds, there is no sophisticated technology involved. Most people use online modes of payment, which is another reason for the rise in cybercrimes.”
The police are running campaigns on social media as well as newspapers to combat cyber frauds, in addition to visiting schools and colleges to teach students how to register an FIR in case of a problem. “People need to be informed about fake shopping sites and online dating apps,” an officer said.
“While the modus operandi of most frauds is the same, the target for each scam changes,” a police source said, adding that in sextortion cases for instance, the target changes depending on the payment capacity of each victim.
