GPay prevented financial scams worth ₹12,000 crore in one year: Google

India has witnessed a notable surge in financial fraud cases in the last few years. According to Google, the company prevented financial scams worth  ₹12,000 crore on their instant payments app — Google Pay, in the last one year. The company also said that GPay has also declined one lakh transactions every day after AI models detected that the transaction could be suspicious.

Google spokesperson said that the company had taken action against almost 3,500 lenders in cases of fraud and non-compliance. Google said that they have collaborated with the Fintech Association for Consumer Empowerment (FACE) and onboard them as a priority flagger, as part of its efforts to combat predatory digital lending apps on google play store.

Financial frauds, ranging from online scams to complex Ponzi schemes, have raised serious questions about the efficacy of regulatory measures and the need for heightened vigilance in the financial sector. To safeguard people from increasingly sophisticated financial scams, Google announced the launch of its flagship program, DigiKavach — an early threat detection and warning system designed to identify and study emerging financial fraud patterns.

Google said that DigiKavach studies the methods and modus operandi of scammers and collaborates with the wider ecosystem of experts. The new program aims to identify and mitigate new scams. Google believes that the initiative will protect users from scams, malware and online fraud.

“To fully realise the potential of digital, ensuring the safety and security of individuals online is not just a necessity, but an imperative. With DigiKavach, we're doubling down our efforts to protect people against ever-evolving financial scams and fraud. Leveraging our internal expertise, we're focused on understanding and detecting threats early so we can act quickly and effectively to prevent the spread of scams and share our insights and findings with committed experts," said Saikat Mitra, Vice President & Head of Trust & Safety, Google APAC.

We are glad to be able to partner with organisations that have been doing incredible work in this space, and to join forces towards the critical endeavour of enabling a safer and more resilient internet for all,” he added.