Stop the scam: On the ‘digital arrest’ menace

The Supreme Court of India’s order of August 4 on the “digital arrest” menace is notable for not being lured into complacency. After all, the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre’s status report showed that complaints on the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal fell from 1,23,672 in 2024 to 58,249 in 2025, and stood at 16,377 in the first six months of 2026. The Court called the figures “certainly encouraging” and directed the Reserve Bank of India to circulate a standard operating procedure for temporary debit holds on mule accounts, States to notify cybercrime coordination centres and operationalise e-Zero FIRs, and an inter-departmental committee to examine a victim compensation framework. Thanks to advisories from banks, telecom operators and the police, fewer senior citizens and others are getting victimised by these scams, which have succeeded due to older victims’ deference to authority and fear of legal trouble. Yet, scammers find it easy to target youth and professionals, and senior citizens the advisories have not reached. And there have been very few convictions despite scrutiny and investigation, which suggests that law enforcement must move faster in tackling these scams.