Residents of Visakhapatnam lost more than ₹60 crore to cyber fraudsters between January and August 2026, a scale of loss that's posing a growing challenge for police, with the recovery rate for defrauded money currently sitting below 12%.
The Scale of Complaints
The cybercrime police station registered around 140 FIRs based on more than 800 complaints filed across the city over this eight-month period. Police officials say they receive roughly 20 complaints a day, with about 20 a month actually converted into FIRs. For context on the broader trend, 2025 saw cybercriminals defraud more than 2,000 people in Vizag, with total losses around ₹122 crore for that year alone.
Investment Frauds Are Driving Most of the Losses
According to a senior police officer, investment frauds involving online trading platforms account for a major share of these losses, with a significant portion of recent cybercrime cases tied specifically to this category. Victims are commonly drawn in through digital arrest scams, bogus stock and investment schemes, fake KYC-update requests, malicious APK files, and phishing messages, tactics that have become depressingly familiar across cyber fraud cases nationally, but continue working regardless.
How Much Has Actually Been Recovered
Despite the scale of overall losses, Vizag city police have managed to refund around ₹28.5 crore to more than 1,550 victims over the past few years. But the recovery process remains genuinely difficult, largely because fraudsters move money rapidly through multiple bank accounts, often faster than investigators can act to freeze and recover funds before they're transferred onward again.
Notably, more than 210 young people, including employees at both private firms and government departments, collectively lost over ₹1 crore in investment scams specifically, a reminder that even educated, employed individuals with stable incomes remain vulnerable to convincingly packaged fraud.
How Fraudsters Keep Moving the Money
Fraudsters allegedly obtain or use existing bank accounts to receive money from victims, then move those funds through a chain of additional accounts to obscure the trail. What makes this particularly hard to stop: even when police freeze existing accounts, criminals simply create new mule accounts to keep the operation running.
Police say fraudsters' accounts are often frozen within minutes of a complaint being filed, but the underlying supply of new accounts doesn't dry up. Investigators have found that some unemployed youths and low-income private employees knowingly supply their own bank accounts to fraudsters in exchange for commissions, a pattern that significantly complicates efforts to trace where the money actually ends up, since the account holder isn't always the person who actually benefits from the fraud.
What's Really Driving This Surge
Police point to greed and the lure of quick profits as the underlying driver behind much of this activity. According to officials, many people are drawn in by the promise of doubling their money within just a few days, and fall for it despite repeated public awareness campaigns already warning against exactly this kind of scheme.
Concerningly, police noted that some victims have attempted suicide after losing large sums of money, underscoring just how devastating the financial and emotional impact of these frauds can be for those affected. Authorities continue urging residents to stay cautious with online investment offers and other suspicious financial schemes.
How to Protect Yourself
Police have advised residents to be genuinely cautious about any online investment offer promising quick or unusually high returns, avoid transferring money to unfamiliar accounts, never share banking details over calls or messages, and steer clear of installing suspicious APK files. Carefully verifying an investment platform and any financial request independently, before making a single payment, remains the single most effective safeguard against this kind of fraud.
If you or someone you know is struggling with thoughts of self-harm, please reach out for support. The AASRA helpline is available 24/7 at 91-9820466726, and the national tele-mental health helpline Tele-MANAS can be reached at 14416 or 1800-891-4416.
FAQs
Q1. How much money have Vizag residents lost to cyber fraud this year?
More than ₹60 crore between January and August 2026, with the recovery rate currently below 12%.
Q2. What type of fraud accounts for the largest share of losses?
Investment frauds involving online trading platforms, alongside digital arrest scams, fake KYC updates, and phishing.
Q3. How much has police managed to recover so far?
Around ₹28.5 crore has been refunded to more than 1,550 victims over the past few years.
Q4. Why is it so difficult to recover money lost to these scams?
Fraudsters move funds rapidly through multiple bank accounts, and continuously create new mule accounts even after existing ones are frozen, often with the knowing participation of individuals supplying their accounts for commissions.