Supreme Court Tightens Digital Arrest Scam Rules; RBI to Frame SOP for Mule Bank Accounts

Key facts

• The Supreme Court directed the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to frame a standard operating procedure (SOP) within four weeks for dealing with mule bank accounts used to launder cyber fraud proceeds.
• The court directed all states and Union territories to operationalise the cyber fraud grievance redressal and money restoration modules developed under the home ministry's January 2, 2026 SOP.
• The court directed the remaining states to notify their State Cyber Crime Coordination Centres within four weeks and adopt the e-Zero FIR system in consultation with the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C).
• The court asked the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), and I4C to study the technical feasibility of time-based restrictions on audio and video calls to curb digital arrest scams.
• The court directed the Inter-Departmental Committee (IDC) to examine a shared liability and victim compensation framework for victims of digital arrest scams.
• The court directed that the next status report include state-wise and bank-wise data on complaints registered, complaints disposed of, restoration orders issued, successful restorations, and amounts restored.
• The court asked the IDC to examine lowering the ₹10 crore threshold for mandatory Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) investigation and aggregating multiple frauds by the same organised network.
• The status report recorded that digital arrest scam complaints on the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal fell from 123,672 in 2024 to 58,249 in 2025 and to 16,377 till June 30, 2026.
• The court noted that over 36,000 cases have been investigated and more than ₹18 crore has been restored to victims through the government's money restoration mechanism.