Protect Your Children From Cyber Criminals

Photo by Nahel Abdul Hadi on Unsplash

"Aunty! Will Bunty come to play?"

 Bunty's friends were over the phone calling him down at Society's Garden to play.

 "Sonu! Bunty is still completing his homework, I will send him in a little while.

 His Mummy told to friends on the phone.

 " Bunty! Go play with your friends, do the rest of work later.

 But Bunty's totally ignored Mummy's voice.  His eyes were on the laptop screen where the flashy game promotions were coming.  Recently, while doing homework on Papa's laptop, he had settled in a different world.  Now he didn't like going down to play.

 "Bunty! Give some rest to your eyes" Bunty's attention was broken by Mommy's loud voice, and he quickly closed the laptop.

 Friends were already playing cricket there.

 "Bunty! If you do this again and again, we will kick you out from the team. Nowadays you don't come regularly for matches."

 "Yes, yes, I don't mind! You don't know what I got."

  Bunty was a student of ninth grade and the rest of his friends also studied between seventh to ninth.  According to their nature, they always consider themselves more mature than age.

 "Good! What did you get, like anything magical?"

 "Guys, you know that when I asked Mummy Papa for a new video game player, they said that our budget  did not allow this for now "

 "Yes, Bunty! Even if we asked him to our parents, they too refused. Actually, it is very expensive, isn't it?"  Sonu replied.

 "Yes, but now this budget won't be such a problem! Because a few days ago when I was doing homework on Papa's laptop, an email showed me in the notification. Curiously, when I opened it, I saw that an uncle had sent an email that we won a lottery of ten lakh and all we had to do is send our account details. Bunty elaborated.

 "Oh wow! So you sent the account details?"  Sonu's curiosity was increasing.

 "Yes, first I thought I should tell Papa, then I thought why not surprise them. So I sent the details from a check book from papa's cupboard" Bunty said.

 "So, Is that money credited?"  It was hard to believe for friends because no one lost an opportunity to boast.

 "No, it will take some time and process. I have talked to that uncle often. I use that mail in a secret box. They have told me how to give an OTP just by Papa's phone to confirm our account validation, and the money will credit the account "

" I wish we all were destined to be such destined people"  and friends went to their homes.  The promise was that everyone would play together on Bunty's video game player.

 After some time Seeing the opportunity, Bunty did his job and shared the OTP to that unknown uncle.

 His Father immediately received a message from the bank that someone had withdrawn money from his account.

 Papa was very upset and asked Bunty's mother if you had spent anything.  Seeing the atmosphere of chaos in the house, Bunty got scared and did not tell anyone anything.  Then his father said that we have to complain to the police so that the culprit is caught.  Bunty now felt that if the matter went to the police, he would surely be punished.  Bunty was crying so badly

 "Mummy! This is my fault, I thought it was for crediting money in our account" and explained the whole thing.

 Father was listening so peacefully.  He explained

 "Look son! Technology is a very good thing, but we are equally at high risk. It's unhealthy to click a link or share an OTP. Greed is a very bad thing. Any short cut is not always safe. Right now we are not that bad. Today you have given out the information of the account in which there were only two thousand rupees. What if the amount was higher? Hopefully you will definitely ask me, son! And I am trying hard to purchase the game.  Working day and night so that I can fulfill your wishes "

 "Papa, I don't want a game, just forgive me".

 A tear of remorse had convinced Bunty that greed and lying could put his family in great danger today.

 At present, online fraud is spreading very fast. So that our children are also being victimized.  Due to the lock down where they have to do online classes, it is our responsibility to be vigilant before giving them gadgets.  Not only fraud, but there are some anti-social elements too who lure children and lead them to wrong sites through wrong links.  With a little understanding, we can protect children from such incidents.  An email ID can be used for online class login that is not used for your bank or office essentials.  Strict instructions should be given to children about OTP and non-essential links.  Pay attention from time to time whether the children are studying or doing something else, for which later the history of the browser can also be seen.  Overall, we have to protect ourselves and our children from this online fraud.

Sushma Tiwari is a Writer, Blogger, and Author. She is the Brand ambassador at Paperwiff a multilingual writing community. Join her on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter.

Found this article useful? Read more blogs at www.themomstore.in.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this post are the personal views of the author. They do not necessarily reflect the views of The Mom Store.