New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday transferred the investigation into the nationwide ‘digital arrest’ scam to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), giving the agency sweeping authority to probe what it described as a crime of unprecedented scale and sophistication.
A Bench led by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant directed that the CBI will serve as the first and primary agency for all cases linked to the scam, in which fraudsters impersonate officials, coerce victims, often senior citizens, into digitally staged “arrests,” and extort large sums of money.
In a significant decision, the court empowered the CBI under the Prevention of Corruption Act (PCA) to investigate the role of bankers who facilitated the opening of accounts used infraudulent operations.
The court also issued notice to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), making it a party to the suo motu proceedings. It asked the RBI to assist in framing timelines for deploying Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning tools to identify suspicious bank accounts and automatically freeze proceeds of crime.
Further, the Bench directed all authorities to comply with CBI requests made under the IT Intermediary Rules, 2021. It said states that have not granted general consent to the CBI must allow the agency to investigate Information Technology Act cases within their jurisdiction to ensure uninterrupted nationwide action. The CBI may also seek Interpol’s assistance wherever necessary, it said.
The Supreme Court instructed the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) to submit proposals for regulating the issuance of SIM cards and for monitoring multiple SIMs issued under a single identity to curb misuse.
The apex court added that state governments must expedite the establishment of cybercrime centres and report any operational hurdles to the court. It emphasised that mobile phone data from all devices seized in cybercrime-related FIRs must be preserved, and ordered all states and Union Territories to hand over IT Act FIRs related to the digital arrest scam to the CBI.
The Bench noted that after it took suo motu cognisance of the matter, several victims approached the court seeking intervention, leading to a surge in FIRs across states, an indication of the scam’s severity.
CJI Surya Kant remarked, “The gravity and scale of the crime can be gauged from the fact that in most states, senior citizens have been targeted by fraudsters using various methods. Every cybercrime case, especially those involving senior citizens, requires a thorough investigation. But the digital arrest scam demands immediate attention from the country’s premier investigating agency.”
The matter will be taken up again in two weeks.
With IANS inputs