India, Oct. 17 -- The Supreme Court on Friday took suo motu (on its own motion) cognisance of the growing menace of "digital arrest" scams -- a sophisticated form of cyber fraud in which criminals impersonate law enforcement officers, intelligence officials, or even judges to coerce and extort money from victims, particularly senior citizens, using forged court orders and fake proceedings.

The court's intervention came after a 73-year-old woman from Ambala, Haryana, wrote a detailed letter to the Supreme Court, describing how she and her husband were virtually "detained" by scammers who produced fake Supreme Court orders and forced them to transfer over Rs.1 crore. The fraudsters, she said, used forged documents purporting to bear the si...