Lok Sabha Question No. 5182 (UNSTARRED), answered on 2025-04-02
Subject: Fake Calls and SMS Scams
Ministry: COMMUNICATION
Asked by: Shri Manickam Tagore B, Shri Vijayakumar Alias Vijay Vasanth

## GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF COMMUNICATIONS DEPARTMENT OF TELECOMMUNICATIONS

## LOK SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 5182 TO BE ANSWERED ON 2 ND  APRIL, 2025

## FAKE CALLS AND SMS SCAMS

## 5182.   SHRI MANICKAM TAGORE B: SHRI VIJAYAKUMAR ALIAS VIJAY VASANTH:

Will the Minister of COMMUNICATION be pleased to state:

- (a) whether the Government is aware of the growing menace of fake calls and SMS scams in the  country,  which  involve  fraudsters  using  spoofing  technology  to  impersonate  legitimate organizations such as banks, Government agencies and service providers;
- (b) if  so,  the  details  of  such  incidents  reported  during  the  last  year,  including the  number  of cases, regions most affected and the estimated financial loss caused by these scams;
- (c) the measures being taken to combat the issue of spoofed calls and SMS scams particularly the use of advanced technology by fraudsters to deceive the public;
- (d) whether  any  awareness  campaigns  are  being  conducted  to  educate  the  public  about identifying and avoiding such fraudulent activities, if so, the details thereof;
- (e) whether any collaboration has been made with telecom operators, law enforcement agencies and cybersecurity experts to trace and take action against the perpetrators of such scams; and
- (f) if so, the details of such collaborations and the success rate in curbing these frauds?

## ANSWER

## MINISTER OF STATE FOR COMMUNICATIONS AND RURAL DEVELOPMENT (DR. PEMMASANI CHANDRA SEKHAR)

(a) to (c) Matters relating to Cyber Crime are under the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) as per allocation of the business rules. Department of Telecommunications (DoT) undertakes efforts to prevent misuse of telecom resources for cyber frauds. Further, 'Police' and 'Public Order' are State subjects as per the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution of India. MHA has established the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (14C) as an attached office to provide a framework and eco-system for  Law  Enforcement  Agencies  (LEAs)  to  deal  with  cyber-crimes.  MHA  has  also  launched  the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal- NCRP (https://cybercrime.gov.in) to enable public to report all  type  of  cybercrimes. As per I4C, total number of complaints on NCRP and amount lost were 19.18 lakh and 22811.95 crore respectively in 2024. Further, DoT 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 from within India. These calls appeared to be originating within India but were being made by the cyber-criminals from abroad by spoofing the Calling Line Identity (CLI).

(d) DoT actively engages with citizens to raise awareness about telecom-related frauds & scams, to  encourage  the  use  of  the  Sanchar  Saathi  App/portal,  a  citizen  centric  initiative  for  accessing information, reporting suspected fraud communications, and staying updated on the latest telecom safety measures.  Engagement with citizens is through robust social media campaigns, regular press releases,  SMS  campaigns  and  collaboration  with  multiple  stakeholders  like  Law  Enforcement Agencies (LEAs)/Banks/TSPs/Student Volunteers etc.

(e) & (f) DoT has developed an online secure Digital Intelligence Platform (DIP) for sharing of  information  related  to  misuse  of  telecom  resources  among  the  stakeholders  for  prevention  of misuse of telecom resources for cyber-crime and financial frauds. About 560 organizations have been onboarded on DIP that include central security agencies, 35 State Police, TSPs, Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre (I4C) etc.  The system to identify and block incoming international spoofed calls  displaying  Indian  mobile  numbers  was  commissioned  on  17.10.2024  and  it  has  shown significant results blocking 1.35 crore calls in 24 hours of its launch, after being identified as spoofed. As on 03.03.2025, calls identified as spoofed and blocked were only 4 lakh so the system has resulted in reduction of almost 97% incoming spoofed calls with Indian CLI.

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