Union home minister Amit Shah on Tuesday said cybercrime posed a
serious threat to national security and warned that India’s data was being stolen and sold to enemies.

Speaking at a conference on Tackling Cyber-Enabled Frauds & Dismantling the Ecosystem in Delhi, organised by the CBI, he said the Centre was taking strong steps to curb such activities as incidents of cyber fraud were on the rise as the country’s digital ecosystem expanded.

“Cybersecurity is also linked to the security of the country. By accessing the data of our important institutions and their databases, and by stealing it, work is also being done to sell to our country’s enemies. We are making efforts to stop it,” he said.

The Supreme Court had on Monday said digital frauds siphoning off over ₹52,000 crore from bank accounts was “robbery and dacoity” and asked the Centre to prepare draft rules in consultation with the Reserve Bank, other banks and the telecom department to deal with such cases.

The court said it should include the RBI’s new standard operating procedure asking banks to temporarily freeze debits from a customer’s account the moment suspicious activity is noticed. The court also asked the government to consider ways of compensating victims of digital fraud.

Underscoring that cybersecurity has become a critical concern as digital transactions and UPI-based payments have become part of daily life, Shah said the home ministry had taken several measures against cybercrime, including raising cyber awareness among citizens.

Several agencies, Shah said, including the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), NIA and the CBI, were working in coordination to combat cybercrime. The conference would help align efforts and strengthen cooperation to deal more effectively with cyber-enabled fraud, he said.

Shah said security agencies led by the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) had so far retrieved or frozen ₹8,189 crore of the ₹20,000 crore feretted away by fraudsters till November 30, 2025.

He said 82 lakh cybercrime complaints were reported during this period, of which 1.84 lakh cases were converted into FIRs. Shah, however, stressed that efforts to curb cybercrime and recover funds must be taken to the next level.

He directed the agencies, especially the CBI and the NIA, to develop a common mechanism to prevent cybercrimes that threaten digital transactions and intensify the fight against cybercrime.