Strangers asking for your phone to make emergency call? Nithin Kamath warns against new scam

Nithin Kamath, the founder and CEO of online brokerage firm Zerodha

Billionaire founder and CEO of Zerodha Nithin Kamath has taken to social media to warn users of a new scam in which conmen steal personal information such as bank account details and OTPs all by pretending to use your phone for an urgent call.

"A stranger approaches you and asks to use your phone to make an emergency call. Most well-meaning people would probably hand over their phone. But this is a new scam," Kamath wrote on X and shared a video produced by Zerodha explaining how the scammers operate. "From intercepting your OTPs to draining your bank accounts, scammers can cause serious damage without you even realizing it."

According to the video, while pretending to use your phone for a call, scammers can download new apps or open existing ones to download personal information or change the phone's settings so that your calls and messages are forwarded to their number, including alerts from your banks. With this information, scammers can access your bank account, OTPs and make unauthorised transactions. They can also change your passwords.

Imagine this: A stranger approaches you and asks to use your phone to make an emergency call. Most well-meaning people would probably hand over their phone. But this is a new scam.From intercepting your OTPs to draining your bank accounts, scammers can cause serious damage pic.twitter.com/3OdLdmDWe5
Nithin Kamath (@Nithin0dha) January 15, 2025

"You won't see anything unusual happening. No obvious signs of tampering, which is what makes it so dangerous... You won't realise what's happening until it's too late," Rajneil R Kamath, founder of Saksham Senior, a platform for online safety, said.

Scammers also tend to target people who are less comfortable with technology or people who seem distracted.

To protect yourself from such scams, Zerodha recommends not handing your phone over to strangers. In case people approach you with such requests, offer to dial the number for them and put the phone on speaker. Ensure that call and message forwarding option in your phone is switched off, Kamath added.