NT, SL cops to visit high-rises to spread word against digi arrest
Times of India | 7 February 2026
Kolkata: Prodded by back-to-back instances of digital-arrest scams targeting wealthy elderly residents in Salt Lake and New Town, Bidhannagar City Police is revamping its cybercrime awareness strategy, planning repeated outreach sessions in housing complexes to ensure every household is reached.
Under the new approach, officers will map residential towers and neighbourhood pockets in Salt Lake and New Town, and hold multiple awareness meetings at a single location over a couple of months, focusing on high-value digital arrest and impersonation scams. Officers said the earlier model — limited to one-two awareness programmes in a complex each year — had failed to draw participation from all families.
Since the start of the year, there have been at least six digital-arrest cases in which victims lost between Rs 5 lakh and Rs 3.3 crore.
"Under the new strategy, officers will systematically map residential towers and neighbourhoods in Salt Lake and New Town, and deliver multiple awareness sessions at each site over short intervals, ensuring repeated contact with residents," an officer said. "We realised that a single event, annually, does not cut it. These scammers are becoming more sophisticated, and it is crucial that awareness is reiterated and reinforced directly within the communities at risk."
Sources said the fresh strategy is the brainchild of the new commissioner of Bidhannagar City Police Murlidhar Sharma, who conducted a similar campaign in Baranagar during his earlier stint as the police chief at Barrackpore Commissionerate.
In the revamped campaign, police teams are scheduled to visit large residential complexes multiple times over a two-month period, hosting interactive briefings with residents, distributing safety guidelines, and addressing specific queries.
"The focus is on educating households about the modus operandi of digital arrest and impersonation frauds, teaching them to identify red flags, like unsolicited calls alleged to be from the CBI, Supreme Court or police cybercrime units, and stressing that no legitimate authority conducts arrests or investigations over video call or demands funds for verification or bail — hallmark of the scam," the officer said.
Cops said most victims are senior citizens living alone or with limited digital literacy, making them particularly susceptible to psychological tactics used by scammers, including threats of arrest, fake documents bearing official seals, and instructions to remain isolated and on continuous video call. "In the earlier awareness initiatives, there were few attendees — mostly RWA office-bearers and their neighbours and friends in the complex. If the cops hold multiple campaigns and make attendance mandatory for more residents, it will ultimately help residents safeguard themselves against such scams," said the secretary of a high-rise complex in New Town.