Only Umratia
There are many schemes run by the central government for farmers, one of which is the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana. Millions of farmers of the country are connected with this scheme. However, now incidents of cheating farmers are happening in the name of this scheme. Cyber goons are lynching farmers in the name of this scheme.
Read this first… In Bihar's Aurangabad district, 22 people have been defrauded in the name of KYC in the name of KYC in Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme in two months. Most of the people got the call from the block office name. In the name of KYC, details including Aadhaar, bank account and OTP were asked. In Rajasthan's Jodhpur, a young man received a message on his phone about the Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme, along with a link. As soon as I clicked on it, the phone got hacked and the bank account was empty. Another youth from Jodhpur received a message that click to join the 'Pradhanmantri Kisan Samman Nidhi' scheme. As soon as he clicked on the link, the unknown app was downloaded. Phone hacked and account empty. In Madhya Pradesh's Chindwara, a farmer's phone received a link in a WhatsApp group in the name of Kisan Samman Nidhi. After clicking on it, the phone hung up. After a few days, it came to know that the bank account has also become empty.
How does fraud occur? Cyber goons send calls, messages or links to farmers in the name of 'Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana', in which they pose as government employees and make various claims. The latter asks for bank account details, OTP, Aadhaar number or other sensitive information. If you got caught in his talk or got caught in the trap of the message sent by him, then understand that he got lime. Different Ways of Fraud Phone – Cyber criminals pretend to be government officials or employees and call farmers. It says your Kisan Samman Nidhi installment has been withheld. For which they will give an excuse of not having KYC or not updating enough details. Then they will ask for bank account, Aadhaar, mobile number and OTP from the farmers. Mostly they also tell the name of the farmers' taluk and village, so that the farmers get confidence. Message – Apart from this, Tax messages or even WhatsApp messages. It should also contain details related to the plan and a link at the bottom. If you click on that link, the phone will be hacked and the control will go to Gathiya. Sometimes messages with such links are circulating in different WhatsApp groups as well. People don't know that by forwarding messages they are helping cyber criminals. website/App – Fake websites and apps are created, which will look like genuine government Website. You will be asked to fill the details by sending the link. Details which in fact reach cyber goons. Sometimes there are also messages that the government has launched a new scheme for farmers, to take advantage of it, click on this link and fill in your details.
How to survive? Remember one thing that no government official or bank employee ever wants sensitive information like account number, aadhaar card or otp on phone. So if someone asks for such details on the phone, be careful and do not share any information. It would stop after getting money, KYC would have to be done etc. Do not click on any unknown link sent on SMS or WhatsApp. By doing this there is a risk of phone hang, virus or data theft. Always download government apps from play store only. Within each village there are gram sevaks and talatis who do this kind of online work. If they have information about various schemes and upcoming updates, meet them first.
Why are farmers more cheated? It has not been long since smartphones and internet reached the hands of the villages and especially the farmers. They don't have much understanding of cyber security and fraud. Taking advantage of this naivety, cyber criminals target them. Lures the government scheme and shows fear of being stopped from getting money. So the only thing to tell the farmers is that someone gets a phone call, a message comes, something comes in Facebook or a video comes on YouTube. Not all of these are necessarily 100% true.
Image Credit: (Divya-Bhaskar): Images/graphics belong to (Divya-Bhaskar).
