Cybercrime in Uttar Pradesh:
Why is this in the News? The DGP of Uttar Pradesh, Rajiv Krishna has recently spoken about addressing Cyber crime for the state and his readiness.
Cybercrime enables illegal activities involving the use of, computers, smart phones or digital networks.
Cybercrime in Uttar Pradesh has grown rapidly in the last few years due to better internet reach, increased digital payment options, more smartphones and a rise in social media usage. In 2023, Uttar Pradesh recorded 10,794 cases of Cyber Crime, up from 10,117 cases in 2022. Uttar Pradesh ranked third in the country, following Karnataka and Telangana, according to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB).
Cybercrime is defined as illegal activities committed through, computers, smart phones or digital networks.
Some of these crimes include:
– Online financial scams and UPI scam
– Social media impersonation
– Job scams, Transaction scam, Game scam
– Data theft and Identity theft
– Hacking, phishing, and ransomware attack
– Illegal betting via the internet and app-based scams
Cyber criminals misuse instant digital payment systems, false job offers, cloned websites, social media impersonation accounts to cheat victims out of their money. Often the criminals operate from remote locations or cross the border physically.

Recent Data and Facts (according to UP DGP Rajeev Krishna):
– In Uttar Pradesh, cyber fraud has rapidly escalated.
– In the past three years, UP Police has blocked or recovered in excess of 700 crores in fraud money.
– Approximately 12% of the UP Police Force has received training on specialized cyber tools.
– According to UP Police, awareness can prevent approximately 75% of cyber fraud.
– The impact of cyber fraud over the last few months has infiltrated rural and small towns, not just in larger urban areas.
– UP creates its first full end-to-end cybercrime vertical with:
– A dedicated portal
– A training program designed by IIT
– A structured 4-course curriculum
– UP Police can now freeze accounts in minutes with digital infrastructure and analysis tools.

Impacts of Cyber Crime:
Cyber crime has serious, widespread consequences:
– Financial loss: Victims lose life savings, business capital, pension funds or a student’s funds.
– Psychological stress: Fear, embarrassment, and a lack of trust in digital platforms.
– Impairs digital trust: Cyber fraud impairs confidence and slows down adoption of official online services.
– Administrative burden: Police will see an increase in case load capacity and demands to respond in a time- sensitive manner.
– Economic risk: A widespread scam will hurt local economies in the long-run and disrupt the digital payment ecosystem.

Primary Challenges in UP:
• Quick escalation of frauds in rural areas – cyber criminals are quickly adapting to digitally-new people.
• Instantaneous payment systems – money can shift within second and leave fraudsters with a significant time advantage.
• Poor digital hygiene – nobody thinks twice before clicking odd or suspicious links, divulging OTPs, or trusting scammers on the phone.
• Decentralized crime syndicates – many gangs operate from an external location (out of the state or even from another country).
• Skills gap – not all police officers are upskilled to conduct sophisticated cyber investigations.
• Technology outpacing police structures – criminals adopt high tech methods quicker than traditional policing structures can react.

Recent Actions Taken by the UP Police:
• UP State Model Police Project: Collates infrastructure, data analytics, and forensic mapping.
• First ever dedicated cyber crime vertical developed training modules with IIT.
• Standardized Cyber Fraud Analysis System to identify patterns of crime.
• 700+ crore of rupees blocked or recovered using rapid response teams.
• Ongoing training for 12% of the police response from the National Cyber Crime Training Centre (CyTrain).
• Crime Mapping grids for Up to identify hotspots for cyber incidents and predict trends across UP.
• Collaborate with banks and telecommunication operators and other national cyber partners across several key cyber fraud initiatives to adequately respond and intervene.
• State-wide public awareness campaign to create awareness for “phishing”, emails with suspicious links and other online frauds involving citizens.

Next Steps:
The UP Government could also encourage the above actions to improve UP’s cybercrime response and assistance.
• Training 25-30% of the police force in advanced cyber skills will offer new skills across the force at the district and central levels
• The development of district-level cyber labs to support and provide a more timely forensic capability across UP
• The commencement of mass literacy campaigns in rural areas to promote safe mobile use by local citizens
• Improving theAI fraud-detection systems that would further improve and facilitate linking banks and payments platforms
• Improving coordination of states and central agencies with appropriate sharing of information
• Making sure school education included digital safety education across subjects
• Introducing stricter controls for digital lenders, payment intermediaries and online deal platforms.

Summary
The challenge of cybercrime, through social media or digital services, presents a potentially significant and terrible law-and-order challenge for UP. The use of technology by criminals to take advantage of vulnerable citizens presents an increasing spread of safety and security challenges for UP Police. The above also talked about UP Police’s work, advancement of new technology, training, rapid response mechanism have been getting repeatedly mentioned for their great work against cybercrime with block over Rs 700 crore had previously been mentioned.
The cyber criminals evolving a rate faster than police ability to react in the cyber world. It does follow, that to be successful effort without stronger digital literacy, stronger validated of policing capability with the community all need to continue to promote preparedness. An on-going credible and order between police and community to build a community engagement and solution, with stronger coordinated not through districts and supported central agencies through new technologies ascertain the digital future of UP’s citizens and businesses.