Paytm CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma Unmasks Bizarre Scam Attempt

It is an era of the internet, with cybercriminals growing increasingly bold by the day. Even top tech guns are not immune. Vijay Shekhar Sharma, Paytm's founder and CEO, recently shared a bizarre and concerning scam attempt where a fraudster impersonated. well, him!.

Moving on to social media, Sharma explained that he had been approached on WhatsApp by someone claiming to be him. Yes, the cheat attempted to cheat Vijay Shekhar Sharma because Vijay Shekhar Sharma. The impersonator requested confidential company data, such as access to funds and the phone number of the finance head of the company. And as if all that was not bold enough, the SMS scammer also sent a suspicious .exe file pretending to be a GST document — an obvious attempt to slip malware into the system.

Fortunately, Sharma was not fooled. Sharing a screenshot of the message, he took the opportunity to use it as a lesson. "Now frauds are being conducted in my name, with my picture. Be careful," he warned his followers.

The timing of the post could not have been more opportune. It came at the heels of a government announcement on a new cyber-tool, the Financial Fraud Risk Indicator (FRI), an initiative proactively aimed at detecting and deterring online financial frauds. The tool is poised to help institutions and individuals detect risk indicators and deter fraudulent activity.

The incident is a bitter reminder that none is too high-profile to be victimized and that cyber scams are not only growing in size but also in creativity. CEOs to common users, being on one's guard and verifying sources — especially when it comes to digital communication and foreign attachments — is more crucial than ever before. 

As Sharma states, "Digital India deserves digital safety."