Cybercrime in Uttar Pradesh is no longer confined to major cities, with fraud networks increasingly targeting smaller towns, semi-urban districts and rural areas as smartphone use, digital payments and online banking expand rapidly across the state, according to National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data and police assessments.
The NCRB data showed UP recorded 11,073 cybercrime cases in 2024, continuing a steady rise from 10,794 in 2023 and 10,117 in 2022. While Lucknow, Noida, Ghaziabad and Kanpur still account for a large share of complaints, police officials said cyber fraud is now being reported more frequently from tier-2 and tier-3 towns.
Investigators said districts that earlier reported only isolated digital fraud cases are now seeing organised scams involving fake investment schemes, UPI fraud, phishing links, OTP theft, sextortion and social media impersonation.
Police officials said the trend reflects a wider digital shift underway in UP, where online transactions and app-based financial services have expanded across smaller markets and rural populations due to affordable smartphones and internet access.
“Fraudsters are no longer concentrating only on metropolitan users. Smaller towns are emerging as soft targets because digital awareness remains relatively low while online financial activity has increased sharply,” a cybercrime investigator said.
Officials said many victims in smaller districts are first-time digital banking users and are often unfamiliar with fraud techniques such as fake customer-care calls, screen-sharing apps, malicious links and cloned payment interfaces.
Investigators said organised cybercrime syndicates increasingly operate through interstate modules using mule bank accounts, fake SIM cards and encrypted communication platforms to avoid detection. Several gangs traced by UP Police in recent years were allegedly operating from hubs in other states while targeting victims across UP through mass-calling and social engineering.
The NCRB figures place UP among states with the highest cybercrime burden in total cases, behind Telangana and Karnataka. However, the state’s cybercrime rate stood at 4.6 per lakh population in 2024, below the national average of 7.3 due to its large population base.
Police said the rise of cybercrime in smaller towns has pushed a shift in policing strategy, with expansion of cyber help desks, stronger digital forensic capabilities and greater coordination with banks, telecom firms and central agencies.
Officials said recovery of defrauded money remains difficult as funds are often routed through multiple accounts within minutes before being withdrawn or diverted via cryptocurrency and online wallets.
The NCRB data also showed UP recorded a chargesheeting rate of 54% in cybercrime cases in 2024, higher than the national average of 31.9%.
www.hindustantimes.com
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