'Bharat Bluff' shows how trust became one of the weakest links online

Bharat Bluff: Inside the Cons of India’s Internet Revolution

by Soumya Gupta

Published by Roli Books

 232 pages ₹495

 

As Arthur Conan Doyle once said, “Life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent.” Soumya Gupta’s Bharat Bluff proves exactly that, plunging readers into a world of digital scams more bizarre and unsettling than fiction itself. The book takes readers through India’s expanding “scam economy” through first-person accounts, rigorous research, and reflections on why the internet in India is increasingly becoming a playing field for predators. 

What distinguishes Bharat Bluff from other works on cybercrime is its sharp insight into human psychology. The book is organised around typologies of deception, with Ms Gupta classifying scams into three psychological categories: Fear, greed, and belief. This framing is particularly effective because it shifts attention from technology to human vulnerability. Her emotion-first approach makes the book especially compelling for readers interested not just in the mechanics of scams, but in the social and psychological realities of digital India. 

Ms Gupta forces readers to confront a new normal in India: In a digital society prioritising convenience and growth, trust has become our greatest vulnerability. “On most days, [the internet’s] seamlessness substantially improves our quality of life. But it also means we do not stop to double-check information most of the time,” she writes. Take UPI, a payment interface that many of us have begun to take for granted. Ms Gupta cites data from the Ministry of Finance showing that reported UPI fraud cases in 2023-24 rose by 85 per cent. Such statistics reveal the scale of India’s scam economy and how seamlessly scammers have integrated themselves into everyday life. 

Some scams do not even have the end goal of soliciting money. Scams of belief take advantage of our human instinct to trust and leave victims psychologically traumatised without having stolen a single penny. Ms Gupta delves into tactics of “social engineering” and manipulation — also known as phishing — that leave a victim primed to be taken advantage of. She cites the case of veteran journalist and TV anchor Nidhi Razdan, who was tricked into believing she had been offered a job at Harvard University, only to discover it was a scam after she had quit her job and publicly announced the news on Twitter (now X). 

Bharat Bluff is filled with first-person accounts of scams that allow readers to comprehend the gravity of India’s scam economy beyond data. Ms Gupta states that “a book about frauds is fundamentally a book about people,” ensuring that she pays respect to the victims who came forward with their stories. She treats these accounts delicately, never allowing the reader to indulge in voyeuristic tendencies of consuming them as “juicy” stories. Every account is treated as a conduit to force the reader to recognise that this could very well have been them. She writes, “The next time you feed your name, number, address, and government ID into a website, chances are it may leak and join a vast ocean of other breached data about you, giving a potential scammer an intimate portrait of your life.” In fact, Ms Gupta recounts anecdotes from personal experiences with digital scams, allowing readers to set aside their ego and confront the reality that India’s scam economy can entrap anyone. 

The book’s biggest strength lies in its ability to provide context on how India’s socio-economic climate is creating the perfect breeding ground for scams. It shines a light on larger structural issues, including unemployment, economic insecurity, and the culture of shame and stigma that often discourages victims from coming forward. 

Ms Gupta also provides readers with tangible steps to avoid scams. From insightful tips from psychologists to information about the Digital Data Protection Act, Ms Gupta empowers readers with the tools we have to protect ourselves. In her conclusion, she states, “The future of India’s internet revolution can be secured if we learn to change ourselves with the times by prioritising awareness, learning to handle our human weakness, and [connecting] with each other beyond guilt and shame.” 

Despite Ms Gupta’s best efforts, you might put down the book with a lingering sense of helplessness before once again surrendering to the convenience of the digital world. Packed with statistics, case studies, expert insights, and daunting cautionary tales, Bharat Bluff can at times feel overwhelming in its sheer breadth. Though this is not a shortcoming of the book itself, the scale of the digital scam ecosystem is so vast that readers may find themselves retreating to what is familiar, even as the book compels them to question it.

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The reviewer is a communications professional with an academic background in gender and sexuality studies