This simple WhatsApp setting can save you from online trading scams; Zerodha’s Nithin Kamath shares how

The booming tech and finance industry in India is facing a threat of rising scams, duping customers of lakhs of rupees in the blink of an eye. A recent such online fraud caught the attention of fintech Zerodha’s CEO, Nithin Kamath, who then offered a simple preventive.

Alarm bells rang on social media, particularly on X (formerly Twitter), after a Bengaluru techie recently narrated his ordeal of losing Rs 91 Lakh to scammers posing as investment financers.

It so happened that the man received a WhatsApp message offering him ‘training’ in making good investments. Soon after, he was added to a Telegram group and made to download two apps. A conman then asked him to transfer his money into an app that listed Indian and US stocks, as an ‘investment’.

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The app then showed that his stocks were making a profit. After making fraudulent claims and asking him to do bank transfers, scammers looted the man of Rs 91 Lakh, following which he filed a complaint.

The plight caught the attention of finance startup, Zerodha’s CEO, Nithin Kamath, who took to his X handle and expressed grief. However, he mentioned a simple setting that WhatsApp and Telegram users should immediately turn on to prevent getting caught in such scams.

Since scammers add people into illegal and fake groups without their intention, Kamath advised people to disable the setting that allows anyone to add them into groups.

pic.twitter.com/ikl3PTa79Y

— Nithin Kamath (@Nithin0dha) November 29, 2024

Notably, both WhatsApp and Telegram offer users the ability to choose who can add them to groups from their settings.

As such, it is best to turn the option to “My contacts” as it prevents unauthorized additions. Fortunately, users who disable the option to let anyone add them to groups can still receive an invite to be added to the ones they want.

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As such, online users must exercise extra caution before clicking on any unidentified link or group invites, a fact noted by Kamath as well.