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B’luru police warn of fraud amid new fine scheme
Senior officers said that fraudsters are sending messages claiming to be challans for traffic violations and mentioning a website address to pay the fine online.
As Bengaluru police have launched a scheme offering a 50 per cent rebate on all traffic fines, fraudsters are using links released by the police as bait to dupe people, officials said.
Senior officers said that fraudsters are sending messages claiming to be challans for traffic violations and mentioning a website address to pay the fine online.
“These messages include a link for payment; however, it directs the user to a fake website for phishing. Following this, Bangalore Traffic Police warned people about potential scams and asked them to be careful while paying any fine through SMS/ online,” officials close to developments said.
The Karnataka government issued an order allowing a 50% discount on the payment of traffic fines in the state until February 11.
The move comes in the wake of a January 27 resolution by the Karnataka State Legal Services Authority to request the state transport department to facilitate “access to justice for all” with regard to traffic fines imposed by the state government across the cities in Karnataka.
Last Thursday, the department issued a circular stating that a 50 per cent discount on traffic fines can be accorded for offences recorded till February 11 as a “one-time measure”.
Following this, traffic fine collection continued on a high note, with the Bengaluru Traffic Police (BTP) collecting ₹41.20 crore for 314,285 cases of violations till Tuesday. Overall, 1.471,593 cases have been cleared so far.
However, the scheme has increased the frequency of phishing messages as well.
According to police, the fraudsters are using the SMS-spoofing technique, where the sender’s name appears as “City Control Room” or “E-Challan Recovery”, making it harder for the people to differentiate. Authorities have advised ensuring that it is a genuine source before making any payment and never putting sensitive information like card number, OTP, password, and other bank account details on unverified links.
Kuldeep Kumar R Jain, deputy commissioner of police (traffic), west division, said that Bengaluru police published links for clearing fines on their social media handles. In case a person receives a message about a fine they can double-check on the traffic police website as well.
“The messages our control room sends do have a link for payment, so if anyone finds the link they received to be suspicious, they can verify them by checking on the website. We strongly advise people to crosscheck the details carefully before paying anything online. If there are still any doubts, the people can visit their nearest traffic police station, and they would guide accordingly,” he said.
Bengaluru has been the city with the highest number of cyber crimes recorded in India. As per the recent National Crime Records Bureau
(NCRB) data, the city had the highest number of cybercrime cases among the 19 metropolitan cities, with 6,423 cases recorded in 2021, which amounts to 37.5 per cent of the total cases recorded in all 19 metropolitan cities.
