I recently met Syed Nazakat, founder of DataLEADS, whose team runs GUARD — a platform that tracks online scams and digital threats.
He shared a number that floored me: 👉 In June 2025 alone, India’s UPI (Unified Payments Interface) moved USD 279 billion.
That’s more than the GDP of some countries. In one month. On mobile phones.
It’s an incredible achievement. UPI is free, real-time, and universal. It has given millions of people in India access to digital payments and lifted countless people into the financial mainstream.
But there’s a dark side. The scammers love UPI too.
The Awareness Gap
The report shows how fast-growing, convenient systems create more places for scammers to operate — especially when users are new to the terrain. What the team observed over 90 days of monitoring:
- Funnel: public posts/ads → brand-like pages/channels → closed groups (WhatsApp/Telegram) → scripted playbooks → payment.
- Bait: “investment/trading tips,” unrealistic gains, paid “courses,” and brand impersonation of financial platforms and influencers.
- Amplifiers:AI/deepfakes — fabricated videos, synthetic documents/IDs — used to manufacture trust and speed up conversion.
This isn’t about intelligence; it’s about exposure and experience. When a billion people get digital “cars,” we need to teach the road rules quickly — or we’ll see more crashes.
Enforcement vs. Scale
Even with large-scale actions (e.g., blocking SIMs/IMEIs linked to fraud), the report notes that coordinated, often cross-border operations keep losses rising. Local enforcement is outpaced by globalised tactics.
My takeaway
Technology has scaled faster than awareness. Until literacy catches up, scammers will keep the advantage. The work now is unglamorous but vital: translate fast-moving threats into simple, repeatable habits.
Call to action: Pick one person this week and show them how to spot “guaranteed return” hooks, brand-impersonation tells, and deepfake red flags. Literacy scales person-to-person.