30 to 35 rate of interest per annum and also harass borrowers by way of taking access to their contactsphotosgallery and sending messages to people known to them do not depend on any unscrupulous app offering shortterm instant loans do not download any apk file verify if these nbfcbacked loan apps are genuine by referring to the rbi website in case of any suspicion please inform the local police stationcyber crime police station and upload it on to ncrp hereby i advise public not to believe anything which is instant whether it is loanappsgiftlotteriesenrollment schemes any other schemes money does not come easy there is no substitute for hard workhardwork only paysq last week i received an email from a friend requesting financial help for a health crisis on the face of it it seemed genuine but when i contacted his family i was told that his mail id was hacked and a lot of his friends received such mails are there any precautions we can take to avoid such instances krishnakumar ranganathan a in this case you have done the right thing by calling relatives of your friend to find out the facts this is what everyone must do we have to be alert all the time and not get carried away by emotions and fall prey to fraudsters hence do not believe anything on the internet that is unbelievable most email service providers have enabled second factor authentication where users can secure their mail accounts by enabling it in some instances fraudsters also create fake mail ids which resemble the original mail ids and send mails to contacts of that person asking for financial favour one should also make hisher social media profiles secure by making changes to their privacy settings almost all social media sites provide these settings if any such profile is found immediately block the account and report it for example an impersonated facebook account can be reported as impostor public is also advised not to rush in to make payments but verify by calling the person from whom the message was received q there are a lot of frauds that one hears about around online payment gateways like paytm these days yet these have become the most common modes of transactions how safe are these platforms how much money should people keep in these wallets satya m a yes most cyber fraudsters are using the services of online payment gateways to collect money through their fake websites may be job related business related and ecommerce related in such cases one must verify the websites and make sure they are genuine before initiating a transaction on the site role of payment gateways is only limited to route the payment between remitter and acquiring banks money in these wallets must be kept depending on the need hereby i advice public to have a dedicated mobile number for using bank services and other services q received a whatsapp text on my mobile along with