To stop people from sharing OTPs with strangers, the Mumbai Police shared a funny reel on its official Instagram account.
Police departments, depending on memes and reels to share important messages has become a trend these days. Mumbai Police’s social media handles are known for sharing humorous posts with warning messages, and once again, the department is back with another humorous reel.
In an Instagram post, the Mumbai Police account shared a short clip of two people standing against each other. On one of the persons, the video shows the text, "Scammers asking you for an OTP. " On another person, it reads, "You giving scammers your OTP."
The department in the caption wrote, "This is not a ‘dilemma’ to be pondered upon! Our Police personnel don’t approve of either. Don’t share your personal or banking information with anyone. Be alert."
In merely two hours, the post has garnered over 8,000 likes and hundreds of comments. In the comment section, one user wrote, "Love the way you guys convey your message with epic ideas and memes," whereas another follower wrote, "Simply admire your social media game!!." A third user gave a funny reply by writing, "Give fake OTP instead. Then it will be you scamming scammers."
In recent years, India has witnessed thousands of financial fraud cases carried out by scammers through the medium of onetime passwords. This year in August, Bhagwat Karad, Minister of State, for Finance in the Rajya Sabha, pointed out, "The number of incidents and the amount of loss incurred by the customers due to phishing, vishing, and credential/OTP compromise attributed to a breach on the part of the customers between 1.4.2020 and 31.3.2022 stood at 9,34,109 and Rs. 1,434.75 crore, respectively."
As per data by Statista, the state of Telangana in 2021 had 1,377 registered OTP frauds, followed by Maharashtra’s 149 cases. Given that OTP-based financial crimesare on the rise, a web series named ‘Jamtara’ has also been released on Netflix, which shows how scammers carry out their fraudulent activities.
For the record, Jamtara is a rural area in the Indian state of Jharkhand, which is called the phishing capital of India.
