New Delhi: Cyber crooks seem to be most active in southern India, with two states – Telangana and Karnataka – recording the highest rate of such crimes and Puducherry figuring prominently on the notorious list among Union Territories, showed National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data on Tuesday.
Telangana has the highest cyber crime rate of 40.3 per cent – almost 10 times the all-India rate of 4.8, according to mid-year data for 2022 collected by the NCRB
The NCRB calculates the cybercrime rate by taking the population of a state or a UT in lakhs and dividing it by the number of such cases of fraud reported during a year.
Maharashtra reported a cyber crime rate of 6.6, with 8,249 such financial crimes recorded in 2022 for a population of 1,257 lakh, said NCRB’s mid-year data.
Andhra Pradesh had a cyber crime rate of 4.4, Assam 4.9, Uttar Pradesh and Odisha 4.3 and Uttarakhand 4.8, it said.
Interestingly, among the large states, West Bengal fared better than many others by reporting a cybercrime rate of 0.4, according to NCRB’s mid-year data for 2022.
Among Union Territories, Delhi emerged as a cybercrime hotspot with a crime rate of 3.2. Puducherry reported a rate of 3.9 as per the mid-year data for 2022 collected by the NCRB.
In 2025, residents of the National Capital lost Rs 70.64 crore in 184 such incidents in the first half of 2025 till June 30, official Delhi Police data showed.
In 2024, Delhi citizens lost Rs 817 crore in 1,591 cybercrime incidents. The number of cyber financial fraud cases registered in Delhi in 2023 was 1,347, and the money lost by victims in such incidents added up to Rs 183 crore.
In 2022, Delhiites lost Rs 231 crore in 1,545 cyber frauds, and in 2021, as many as 1,630 cyber fraud matters left residents of the National Capital poorer by Rs 91 crore, said Rai.
Delhi Police data showed that since 2017, when 454 cyber crimes were reported, the incidents of such financial crimes increased almost threefold till 2024, which recorded 1,591 cases.
Earlier, Minister of State in the Ministry of Home Affairs Nityanand Rai told Lok Sabha in a written reply that as part of counter-cyber crime measures, the Delhi Police has set up IFSO (Intelligence Fusion and Strategic Operations) equipped with the latest equipment and software to investigate complex and sensitive cases of cyber crimes.
Besides, one Cyber Police Station in each of the 15 Districts of Delhi Police has become
functional since 2022 to deal with such cases in Delhi, he said.
Help desks at all police stations are equipped to assist women affected by cybercrimes. A specialised Unit SPUWAC (Special Police Unit for Women and Children) is also functioning in the Delhi Police to handle such cases with sensitivity and urgency, said Rai.
The MoS said to strengthen the mechanism to deal with cyber crimes in a comprehensive and coordinated manner, the Central Government has taken various steps which, inter alia, include: setting up the ‘Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre’ (I4C) to deal with all types of cyber crimes in the country; launch of the ‘National
Cyber Crime Reporting Portal’ (NCRP) (https://cybercrime.gov.in); launch of The ‘Citizen Financial Cyber Fraud Reporting and Management System’ (CFCFRMS) and establishment of a state-of-the-art, Cyber Fraud Mitigation Centre (CFMC).
The Central government has also established a state-of-the-art ‘National Cyber Forensic Laboratory (Investigation)’ and developed the Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) platform, namely ‘CyTrain’ portal, he said.
(IANS)
