Cyber crimes can intrude into one’s life in countless different ways. A person might be specifically targeted by a crypto scammer draining their account, or an anonymous email user sending them death threats. In other cases, a person scrolling on social media might have accidentally seen child abuse videos or illegal pornography uploads, and is wondering how to inform the police.
For example: after a hack on July 18 that led to the theft of assets worth over $230 million, Indian crypto exchange WazirX’s CEO Nischal Shetty said that the company had filed an online complaint with the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal.
However, anyone can use this portal to report a cyber crime or even nuisances such as spam senders or those unfairly squatting on web domains.
The portal offers reporting facilities for people who wish to receive police support as well as those wanting to anonymously register their complaint when reporting a crime related to “online Child Pornography/ Rape or Gang Rape (CP/RGR) content,” per the website.
On the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal, users can report cyber-based financial crimes such as fraud and scams, cyber crimes that are related to women/children, gangrape content or child abuse media, as well as cyber crimes that might not fall neatly under these categories. Remember that the creation/distribution of morphed or AI-generated images can also be considered a crime.
Based on the information provided by the user, the respective police department for each state or territory will then take over the case and pursue it as required.
A screenshot of the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal | Photo Credit: National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal
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What to prepare
If you are registering a complaint that is not anonymous, keep some form of national identification—such as your Adhaar card or PAN card—ready to upload with the complaint.
Keep your phone nearby in order to receive OTPs when making the complaint or submitting your form.
Safely keep any and all evidence related to the cyber crime that you wish to report. Examples of evidence you should preserve, make copies of, or submit for police reference include credit card receipts, bank statements, any envelopes, brochures/pamphlets, copies of emails, URLs of webpages, chat transcripts, the suspects’ mobile number screenshots, videos, images, or any other kind of document, per the website.
A screenshot of the submission form from the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal | Photo Credit: National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal
Additional information or media about the suspect/perpetrator is also helpful to submit.
In case of a financial crime online, the portal advises users to keep evidence ready such as the bank/wallet/merchant involved, the 12-digit Transaction ID or UTR number, the date of the transaction, the fraud amount, as well as other information you may have collected earlier.
Maintaining a timeline of events or having a short summary of what took place can also help you recall the situation clearly and calmly.
About reporting sexual crimes online
Some already registered cyber crime complaints can be withdrawn before they are converted into an FIR. However, complaints filed under the women/child-related crime section cannot be withdrawn, per the portal.
Whether one is an Indian who was victimised by a foreign perpetrator, or a foreign complainant who was victimised by an Indian perpetrator, they can both use the portal to report the cyber crime. You can also report cyber crimes you witnessed but were not involved in.
Other solutions
Apart from registering a complaint through the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal or visiting the local police station, affected users can also contact the grievance officer of the digital platform where they were victimised (if applicable).
The grievance officer is a government-mandated official who works with large social media platforms and whose duty is to take charge of such legal complaints from users. Their contact details are easily found online. Google and Meta, for example, have grievance officers in India.
Users can reach out directly to the platform’s support team to raise their issue, as large companies are mandated to act quickly when notified about potentially illegal content on their platforms.
How to file a cyber crime complaint through the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal
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