Response time refers to the time taken by banks to reply to investigators’ queries regarding account details, bank statements, and transaction records of accounts involved in cybercrimes.
Banks have finally begun assisting cybercrime investigators by reducing their response time, but technical shortcomings and delays in framing a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for defreezing lien-marked amounts continue to trouble victims.
According to data accessed by The Hindu, banks’ response time to police enquiries and notices averaged 15 to 20 days in 2024, depending on the bank. In 2025, this has come down to about a week.
Pronab Mohanty, Director General of Police (DGP), Cyber Command Unit (CCU), told The Hindu that some banks have even brought their average response time down to three days, giving investigators a better edge in progressing cases.
Response time refers to the time taken by banks to reply to investigators’ queries regarding account details, bank statements, and transaction records of accounts involved in cybercrimes.
“Unlike conventional crimes, where there are multiple leads, bank transactions and other banking-related aspects are the primary leads in cybercrime investigations. If banks delay information, investigations lag and the chances of cracking cases reduce,” Mr. Mohanty explained, underscoring the importance of timely responses.
Police attributed the improvement to frequent meetings with bank authorities, which led to the appointment of liaison and nodal officers. According to senior police officers, investigators can now directly raise issues with nodal officers in case of delays, reducing time lost to unnecessary formalities.
The Criminal Investigation Department had earlier held a joint meeting with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and representatives of banks to highlight how long response times were hampering investigations.
However, the money recovery rate in cybercrime cases fell below 10% in the State in 2025. A senior cybercrime investigator said response time was only one step forward, as banks are yet to address several issues, particularly those related to mule accounts.
KYC norms and mule accounts
“The banks need to tighten their KYC verification process while opening accounts. Lenient verification has created loopholes, facilitating easy creation of mule accounts, which form the backbone of financial cybercrimes,” the senior officer said.
In 2024 alone, more than 70,000 mule bank accounts had been used in Karnataka, and that figure accounted only for the first layer of mule accounts.
Another major concern is the lax monitoring of suspicious money transactions. A robust monitoring system could help flag cybercrimes at an early stage and improve the chances of intercepting the siphoned money.
Lien-mark notices
Over the past two years, there has been a trend of innocent individuals’ bank accounts being frozen due to erroneous and mischievous reporting of cybercrime activity by citizens. When affected account holders approach banks, they are directed to the police. However, in mischievous cases, there is often no FIR, leading to further complications.
“This issue has disrupted many small businesses in the state, causing financial losses. There have even been cases where school accounts were blocked,” a police officer said .
In another scenario, cybercrime victims who recover their lost money after investigations are also facing account freezes. Once a victim receives recovered funds from a mule account, which is often linked to multiple cases, subsequent investigations may identify the victim’s account as the last mule account, resulting in it being frozen. The victim then has to undergo the entire process again.
The Ministry of Home Affairs has drafted an SOP to address these concerns, but it is yet to be finalised.
Published – January 05, 2026 12:24 pm IST
