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Indian diplomats in US face rise in impersonation scams targeting diaspora
Indian diplomats in US face rise in impersonation scams targeting diaspora
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Indian diplomats in US face rise in impersonation scams targeting diaspora
Indian diplomatic missions have reached out to community members urging greater caution when fielding calls purporting to be from Indian missions.
Updated on: Jul 10, 2026, 10:44:16 IST By Shashank Mattoo Prefer HTon Google Share via Copy link Indian diplomats and officials posted in the United States are grappling with a fresh challenge: an uptick in scammers impersonating officials from Indian diplomatic missions to target members of the Indian diaspora in America. Members of the Indian diaspora in America have taken to social media platforms to relate their stories. (File Photo) Officials speaking to HT said that Indian missions receive several complaints every week from the Indian diaspora about such scams. Using digital technologies to spoof phone numbers with US area codes, these scammers impersonate Indian diplomats for a range of scams that run the gamut from requesting fees from victims to expedite travel documentation to telling victims that their India-based cellphone numbers have been used in terrorist activities. Indian diplomatic missions - recognising the problem - have issued advisories and reached out to community members urging greater caution when fielding calls purporting to be from Indian missions. Also Read: 15 arrested in Operation Hard Ball were living illegally in US; gang recruiters targeted visa applicants “This has been an issue for us over the last 7-8 months. Some of the local staff in our mission handling emergency issues get maybe 5-10 calls from the community saying that these people have been getting in touch with them. I think cumulatively it can sometimes take up to an hour a day for our staff working on these issues,” said one official aware of the matter. Members of the Indian diaspora in America have taken to social media platforms like Reddit to relate their stories with dozens detailing fraudulent calls from scammers pretending to be Indian diplomats. One poster received a call from a woman claiming to represent the Indian consulate in San Francisco. “They said a phone number in India was sending threatening messages and that my US number was listed as the emergency contact. Their hook was having my full name and US number correct, which made me listen for a bit. They said that there was a document from the ministry of external affairs waiting for me at the consulate and that I should come to San Francisco to pick it up. There was no written notice or way to verify the claim. The caller hinted at legal consequences and tried to keep me on the line,” wrote another user. Also Read: RICO Act once took down mafia in New York. US now used it against Bishnoi gang Dozens of users replied to the post stating they had received similar calls. In some instances, different users recounted receiving calls from a scammer using the same name - Kunal Mann in one case - using a dozen distinct numbers. In one case, a user was contacted by a man named Anurag Sharma, who claimed to be an official in the Indian Embassy. Sharma informed the user that someone had used their identity to purchase a SIM card in India which was then used to scam people. Sharma said an active investigation had been opened and a “No Objection Certificate” had to be obtained to clear up the matter. Sharma then offered to transfer the user to a “direct line” with Delhi Police, where a man claiming to be a police officer offered to help expedite the “investigation” for a fee. While the user ultimately refused to pay the sum, he recounted that the scam had been “very convincing.” Scams targeting Indian-Americans, including impersonation scams, have risen dramatically in recent years. Government data presented in the Rajya Sabha by the Ministry of External Affairs shows complaints in the United States increased dramatically from just 8 cases in 2024 to 613 cases in 2025, a nearly 75-fold increase. Also Read: 24 people with links to India-based gangs arrested in US, Canada, Europe Experts say advances in technology, including Artificial Intelligence, have made impersonation scams more dangerous. “They often use scripted narratives, fake documents, and caller ID manipulation to appear legitimate. Recent advances in technology - particularly AI - have made these scams more convincing, enabling voice cloning, automated targeting at scale, and personalized social engineering. As a result, it has become easier for fraudsters to create realistic, high-pressure interactions that exploit fear and confusion among diaspora communities,” says Gaurav Sharma, global head of architecture and product solutions at TransUnion. In a statement to HT, the Indian Embassy in Washington said it is working to address the issue by working with the US government and issuing public advisories. "The Embassy has been actively addressing incidents involving fraudulent calls in which scammers spoof Embassy telephone numbers and impersonate Embassy officials. We have issued public advisories on the websites of the Embassy and our Consulates and are regularly disseminating warnings through our outreach to the Indian-American community. We are also working with U.S. authorities to report and investigate these incidents,” the Embassy said. The Embassy added that officials from the Indian embassy and consulates never solicit money and other personal information over the phone from members of the diaspora. The Embassy also urged those receiving scam calls to report them to law enforcement and Indian diplomatic missions. Officials told HT that jurisdictional limits place restrictions on their ability to combat these scammers. However, they pointed to possible avenues of cooperation between New Delhi and Washington, including with America’s Scam Center Strike Force. This multi-agency effort began in 2025 and pools the resources of the US Secret Service, FBI and the Department of Justice to crack down on global scam networks centered in Southeast Asian countries and protect Americans. Joint operations by Indian and American law enforcement authorities have shown results. In February this year, America’s Federal Bureau of Investigation announced that it had worked with India’s Central Bureau of Investigation to shut down a scam call center network in India that had been targeting Americans using “government impersonation” and other methods. The scam centers had caused an estimated $48 million in economic losses to Americans, the FBI noted. Indian Embassy United States Get the latest headlines from US news and global updates from Pakistan, Nepal, UK, Bangladesh, Russia and US Iran war Live, get all the latest headlines in one place on Hindustan Times. Home/World News/Indian Diplomats In US Face Rise In Impersonation Scams Targeting Diaspora See LessIndian diplomats and officials posted in the United States are grappling with a fresh challenge: an uptick in scammers impersonating officials from Indian diplomatic missions to target members of the Indian diaspora in America.
Officials speaking to HT said that Indian missions receive several complaints every week from the Indian diaspora about such scams. Using digital technologies to spoof phone numbers with US area codes, these scammers impersonate Indian diplomats for a range of scams that run the gamut from requesting fees from victims to expedite travel documentation to telling victims that their India-based cellphone numbers have been used in terrorist activities.
Indian diplomatic missions - recognising the problem - have issued advisories and reached out to community members urging greater caution when fielding calls purporting to be from Indian missions.
Also Read: 15 arrested in Operation Hard Ball were living illegally in US; gang recruiters targeted visa applicants
“This has been an issue for us over the last 7-8 months. Some of the local staff in our mission handling emergency issues get maybe 5-10 calls from the community saying that these people have been getting in touch with them. I think cumulatively it can sometimes take up to an hour a day for our staff working on these issues,” said one official aware of the matter.
Members of the Indian diaspora in America have taken to social media platforms like Reddit to relate their stories with dozens detailing fraudulent calls from scammers pretending to be Indian diplomats. One poster received a call from a woman claiming to represent the Indian consulate in San Francisco.
“They said a phone number in India was sending threatening messages and that my US number was listed as the emergency contact. Their hook was having my full name and US number correct, which made me listen for a bit. They said that there was a document from the ministry of external affairs waiting for me at the consulate and that I should come to San Francisco to pick it up. There was no written notice or way to verify the claim. The caller hinted at legal consequences and tried to keep me on the line,” wrote another user.
Also Read: RICO Act once took down mafia in New York. US now used it against Bishnoi gang
Dozens of users replied to the post stating they had received similar calls. In some instances, different users recounted receiving calls from a scammer using the same name - Kunal Mann in one case - using a dozen distinct numbers.
In one case, a user was contacted by a man named Anurag Sharma, who claimed to be an official in the Indian Embassy. Sharma informed the user that someone had used their identity to purchase a SIM card in India which was then used to scam people.
Sharma said an active investigation had been opened and a “No Objection Certificate” had to be obtained to clear up the matter. Sharma then offered to transfer the user to a “direct line” with Delhi Police, where a man claiming to be a police officer offered to help expedite the “investigation” for a fee. While the user ultimately refused to pay the sum, he recounted that the scam had been “very convincing.”
Scams targeting Indian-Americans, including impersonation scams, have risen dramatically in recent years. Government data presented in the Rajya Sabha by the Ministry of External Affairs shows complaints in the United States increased dramatically from just 8 cases in 2024 to 613 cases in 2025, a nearly 75-fold increase.
Also Read: 24 people with links to India-based gangs arrested in US, Canada, Europe
Experts say advances in technology, including Artificial Intelligence, have made impersonation scams more dangerous.
“They often use scripted narratives, fake documents, and caller ID manipulation to appear legitimate. Recent advances in technology - particularly AI - have made these scams more convincing, enabling voice cloning, automated targeting at scale, and personalized social engineering.
As a result, it has become easier for fraudsters to create realistic, high-pressure interactions that exploit fear and confusion among diaspora communities,” says Gaurav Sharma, global head of architecture and product solutions at TransUnion.
In a statement to HT, the Indian Embassy in Washington said it is working to address the issue by working with the US government and issuing public advisories.
"The Embassy has been actively addressing incidents involving fraudulent calls in which scammers spoof Embassy telephone numbers and impersonate Embassy officials. We have issued public advisories on the websites of the Embassy and our Consulates and are regularly disseminating warnings through our outreach to the Indian-American community. We are also working with U.S. authorities to report and investigate these incidents,” the Embassy said.
The Embassy added that officials from the Indian embassy and consulates never solicit money and other personal information over the phone from members of the diaspora. The Embassy also urged those receiving scam calls to report them to law enforcement and Indian diplomatic missions.
Officials told HT that jurisdictional limits place restrictions on their ability to combat these scammers. However, they pointed to possible avenues of cooperation between New Delhi and Washington, including with America’s Scam Center Strike Force. This multi-agency effort began in 2025 and pools the resources of the US Secret Service, FBI and the Department of Justice to crack down on global scam networks centered in Southeast Asian countries and protect Americans.
Joint operations by Indian and American law enforcement authorities have shown results. In February this year, America’s Federal Bureau of Investigation announced that it had worked with India’s Central Bureau of Investigation to shut down a scam call center network in India that had been targeting Americans using “government impersonation” and other methods. The scam centers had caused an estimated $48 million in economic losses to Americans, the FBI noted.
Source: HindustanTimes
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