DoT FRI prevents over Rs 5,000 crore in suspected cyber fraud losses

MUMBAI: In the fight against cyber fraud, the best money trail is the one that never starts. The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) says its Financial Fraud Risk Indicator (FRI) has helped prevent suspected cyber fraud losses of more than Rs 5,000 crore within 15 months of its launch on May 22, 2025.

The cumulative value of suspected fraud losses prevented through FRI reached Rs 5,043.73 crore by August 2026, sharply up from Rs 139.16 crore in August 2025. More than Rs 2,000 crore was prevented in the four months from April 2026 alone, as banks and payment platforms expanded their use of the system.

The latest milestone marks a significant shift in how digital fraud is tackled. Instead of waiting for money to disappear and then attempting to trace, freeze or recover it, FRI is designed to flag potential risk before a transaction goes through.

Developed under DoT’s Digital Intelligence Platform (DIP), FRI assesses in real time whether a mobile number is likely to be associated with cybercrime or financial fraud. It classifies numbers into three categories — Medium, High and Very High risk — using intelligence from multiple sources.

These include citizen reports submitted through Sanchar Saathi, the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre’s National Cybercrime Reporting Portal (NCRP), telecom operators, banks, financial institutions and other telecom-related parameters.

The resulting intelligence is securely shared through DIP with banks, payment service providers, insurers, securities intermediaries and pension-sector entities. Institutions can then incorporate the signals into customer onboarding, transaction monitoring and fraud-detection systems.

The difference is essentially one of timing. A successful cyber fraud can send money through multiple mule accounts within minutes, turning recovery into a race against the clock. An FRI check, by contrast, is performed in a fraction of a second when a payment is initiated, potentially stopping the transaction before the loss occurs.

That also means the Rs 5,000-crore figure does not capture the full effect of prevention. The benefit extends to complaints that may never have been filed, investigations that may never have begun, accounts that did not need to be frozen and citizens spared the financial and emotional fallout of fraud.

The framework is being expanded beyond traditional banking and payments. DoT is extending FRI intelligence to securities-market intermediaries, insurance companies and pension-sector stakeholders, with the aim of identifying risks involving trading and demat accounts, insurance transactions and pension accounts.

The effort is backed by a wider cross-sector network. DoT has worked with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) and other financial-sector stakeholders to embed FRI signals into fraud-prevention workflows.

Building the system has also involved training. DoT has conducted more than 25 sessions covering 1,500 banks, financial institutions and regulators on FRI methodology, DIP integration and the use of risk signals in fraud workflows.

Citizen participation remains another key part of the system. Reports of suspicious calls and messages made through Sanchar Saathi and its Chakshu service feed intelligence into the wider fraud-prevention ecosystem. DoT said a single report can help generate warnings that protect other potential victims.

The FRI sits within the larger Digital Intelligence Platform, which was launched in 2024 and enables real-time intelligence sharing among more than 1,600 stakeholders, including telecom service providers, banks, financial institutions, law-enforcement agencies and government departments.

DIP also supports the Mobile Number Revocation List (MNRL), which shares numbers disconnected for reasons including cybercrime involvement, failed re-verification, telecom-service-provider analysis and violations of prescribed connection limits. By distributing such information in near real time, stakeholders can strengthen fraud controls and prevent revoked numbers from being misused.

For citizens, DoT advises taking payment warnings seriously, reporting suspicious calls, SMS or WhatsApp messages through Sanchar Saathi, and contacting 1930 or the National Cybercrime Reporting Portal immediately in case of financial cyber fraud. It also recommends checking mobile connections issued in their name, reporting lost or stolen handsets and verifying the genuineness of a handset before purchase.

As FRI expands across financial and digital services, DoT is betting that the most effective cyber-fraud intervention is the one that happens quietly, quickly and before the money moves. In this case, stopping the trail may be more valuable than following it.