New Delhi, February 10 The rise of artificial intelligence has led to the industrialization of cybercrime, with organized gangs carrying out a large number of automated attacks, a top official of the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre said on Tuesday.
Speaking at the Global CyberPeace Summit 2026, Rajesh Kumar, CEO of the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre, said that the cyber attacks carried out between 2024 and 2025 have seen a significant adoption and automation of AI.
The Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre (I4C), set up by the home ministry, is a nodal agency for providing a framework for law enforcement agencies to deal with cybercrime.
"The biggest change is that cybercrime is now being committed on an industrial scale. The technology has enabled the industrialization of cybercrime. By industrialization, I mean the organized criminal gangs, mostly operating from Southeast Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and possibly within parts of our country. They have bureaucratic structures with specialized wings," Kumar said.
He said that these gangs have a human resource that recruits, takes care of their promotion and remuneration.
"They have a research and development wing that identifies the weaknesses that can be exploited, and how to exploit them. They exploit technology, the weaknesses in the technological systems that we adopt, and they also identify the weaknesses in the human psyche," he said.
He said that several attacks were in the form of a social engineering attack, but they were aided by AI.
"Globally, it is estimated that the cost of cybercrime for the year 2025 was around USD 10.8 trillion. This is the cost of cybercrime. It is expected to grow to around USD 12 trillion this year," he said.
Kumar said that state-backed actors are using criminal infrastructure to further their geopolitical objectives.
According to several global think tanks, 80 per cent of cyber attacks are now AI driven, he said.
"Those of you who have received SMSs that your challan is sending, it was being sent, created, and personalized by AI. AI is auto-scripting, it is drafting, and it is executing. The messages that you are getting, whether it is in the form of an SMS or whether it is a WhatsApp communication, it is hyper-personalized. So, you are made to believe," Kumar said.
Even in the cases of digital arrests, AI is being used to show the face of a famous police officer to make one believe that the person on the other side is an actual police officer, he said.
Kumar said that a new modus operandi has come to light of a triple extortion model, where the criminal would install ransomware, encrypt data, and then threaten to leak the data.
"Another very disturbing trend that we are seeing is crime as a service. Now gangs are there, which are offering crime as a service. That means you want to commit a crime, but you do not know how to go about it. Hire somebody else to do the crime," he said, and shared a number of cybercrimes, which sometimes target senior government officers.
Ranjana Jha, Vice Chancellor of the Indira Gandhi Delhi Technological University for Women (IGDTUW), said that among the many technologies that are driving digital transformation in modern enterprise, artificial intelligence stands apart as the most disruptive and consequential.
"AI-driven human-computer interaction is no longer experimental; it is routine, invisible, and pervasive. AI is transforming healthcare, finance, education, and justice at a breathtaking speed, yet public trust remains fragile. India needs widespread AI literacy. AI literacy will not only improve the quality of life but will also improve the quality of life," she said.
CyberPeace Founder and Global President Vineet Kumar said that a safer internet is about trust and safety online, which cannot be achieved through policy alone.
"It has to be lived every day by citizens, institutions, and governments alike. CyberPeace is about moving conversations from the grassroots to policymakers and ensuring that technology remains safe, responsible, and inclusive for everyone," he said.
