In new Aadhaar fraud, conmen loot bank accounts using UPI

The United Payments Interface (UPI) is a system through which Indian users can transact across 30 banks in the country with the help of a smartphone. The UPI was developed by the National Payments Corporation of India.

The victims who have complained have said that a person calls them as a Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) representative and pretends to help them through the process of linking PAN with Aadhaar. Subsequently, the people are asked to reveal the one time password generated on the mobile phone linked to Aadhaar which completes the job.

Kislay Chaudhary, cyber security consultant told Scroll that the conman uses the OTP to replace the user's number in the UIDAI interface with theirs, thus linking their number to the victim's Aadhaar. The UPI supported interface is then downloaded to the phone which detects the Aadhaar number linked to the phone number automatically and gives access to the bank account in the Aadhaar number. The conman then can generate the transactions.

Bhisham Singh, Deputy Commissioner of Police in Delhi was quoted as saying, "The pretext of linking Aadhaar with PAN seems like a new trend among conmen, who keep updating themselves with the times. We have a dedicated department in the cyber cell which looks into all such cases. Investigation into several such cases is underway."

The UIDAI has informed that it is aware of such frauds taking place and said that the common people should be made aware that no such calls are being forwarded by the UIDAI.