India’s central bank is considering implementing delays on high-value digital transactions alongside additional verification steps for payments made by senior citizens as part of a comprehensive strategy to tackle the escalating problem of online fraud. This was outlined in a discussion paper published on Thursday.
The rise in digital payment fraud in India has been driven by factors such as fake call centers, mule bank accounts used by criminals to receive and transfer stolen funds, and advanced scams including deepfake impersonations. To address these challenges, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has proposed introducing a one-hour delay on account-to-account transfers exceeding 10,000 rupees ($107.92) conducted through fast payment systems like the Unified Payments Interface (UPI). This delay aims to provide customers with a window to cancel suspicious transactions.
Notably, these delays would exclude merchant payments, which already benefit from existing dispute resolution processes. The RBI also suggested a system where a provisional debit is applied to the customer’s account during the delay period, accompanied by alerts if transactions appear suspicious. Meanwhile, low-value transactions would continue to be processed instantly to avoid disruption of everyday payments.
Data from the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal reveals that reported digital payment fraud cases surged more than tenfold, reaching 2.8 million between 2021 and 2025. During the same period, the financial losses from such frauds escalated nearly 40 times, totaling 230 billion rupees ($2.49 billion).
In a significant development, the RBI is also considering enhanced protections for elderly and vulnerable individuals, who are often targeted by scammers. Under the proposed measures, customers aged 70 and above, as well as persons with disabilities, may be required to obtain approval from a “trusted person” for transactions exceeding 50,000 rupees. However, customers would likely have the option to opt out of this safety mechanism.
The RBI emphasized that older adults and differently-abled persons are particularly susceptible to social engineering frauds, which often result in disproportionately large financial losses. Additional proposals include setting annual transaction limits on certain bank accounts pending further verification and introducing “kill switches” that enable users to instantly disable all digital payments.
The central bank has invited public comments on the discussion paper until May 8 and plans to consider formalizing guidelines after reviewing the feedback. The exchange rate used is $1 = 92.4400 Indian rupees.
