1 in 3 UPI payments unprotected as Google Pay skips fraud tool: DoT

NEw new delhi: Google make up has non in time structured the government’s Fraud Risk Indicator (FRI), a system that flags mobile numbers based on their likelihood of being linked to financial scams, onto its platform, Department of Telecommunications (DoT) secretary Neeraj Mittal said on Friday.Developed by the DoT, the FRI classifies phone numbers by risk level to help digital payment platforms detect and block fraudulent transactions. When users attempt payments through digital platforms, medium-risk numbers trigger warning pop-ups advising caution. High and very high-risk classifications can result in complete transaction blocks.According to a DoT official, the idea of FRI is to stop financial fraud at its source. “With Google Pay yet to integrate the FRI into its payment system, roughly a third of Indians using the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) remain unprotected. Google Pay accounts for about 30-35% of all UPI transactions on an average,” the official said on anonymity, adding that its competitors, PhonePe and Paytm, have already integrated the FRI into their payment services.The official said that multiple discussions have taken place with Google. “Being a multinational corporation, they have said that their development takes a longer time. In the meantime, it has been implemented by more than 50 Banks and UPI players in the country in less than two months,” the official said. The official added that the government’s aim is a Secure Sovereign Svadeshi (home-grown) UPI ecosystem through FRI integration.At the India Mobile Congress (IMC) event on October 8, a team from PhonePe, Paytm and the DoT gave a presentation to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in which PhonePe claimed to have helped citizens avert potential financial fraud losses of around ₹125 crore while Paytm said it has helped save ₹68 crore in the last two months owing to the FRI.Rajesh Ranjan, Google’s India Core Lead for Government Affairs and Public Policy, confirmed that the company is in discussions with the DoT regarding the integration, adding that Google has its own AI-based fraud prevention initiative, DigiKavach, which identifies, studies, and blocks online financial scams.Google India’s head of government affairs and public policy, platforms & devices Aditi Chaturvedi told HT that the FRI is a good initiative, but refused to comment on it further. HT also received a conflicting statement from a Google spokesperson, who said, “Google Pay has integrated FRI and follows the relevant reporting processes”. However, this was refuted by Ranjan.As per data from August 2025, Google Pay recorded the second-highest number and value of UPI transactions, behind PhonePe. Customer-initiated transactions on Google Pay stood at 7,063.76 million, worth ₹8,83,682.27 crore, accounting for 35% of total UPI transactions in August. In comparison, PhonePe and Paytm (third-highest) reported transaction values of ₹11,99,457.73 crore and ₹1,43,484.97 crore, respectively.In a push to strengthen digital security, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in June directed all scheduled commercial banks, small finance banks, payments banks, and co-operative banks to mandatorily integrate the FRI into their systems. The move comes as over 86% of Indian households are now connected to the internet, increasing both digital participation and vulnerability to online fraud. The DoT had described RBI’s directive as “a watershed moment in the fight against cyber-enabled financial frauds”.DoT is of the view that with UPI now the go-to way to pay across India, FRI could help millions of people avoid falling into cyber fraud traps, with cybersecurity incidents rising from 1.029 million in 2022 to 2.268 million in 2024. DoT has blocked over 942,000 SIM cards and 263,348 IMEIs linked to cyber frauds so far.