#FactCheck - Viral Video of US President Biden Dozing Off during Television Interview is Digitally Manipulated and Inauthentic

Introduction

On May 21st, 2025, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) launched the Financial Risk Indicator (FRI) feature, marking an important step towards safeguarding mobile phone users from the risks of financial fraud. This was developed as a part of the Digital Intelligence Platform (DIP), which facilitates coordination between stakeholders to curb the misuse of telecom services for conducting cyber crimes.

What is the Financial Risk Indicator (FRI)?

The FRI is a risk-based metric feature that categorises phone numbers into risk, medium risk, and high risk based on their association with financial fraud in the past. The data pool enabling this intelligence sharing includes the Digital Intelligence Unit (DIU) of the DoT, which engages and sends a list of Mobile Numbers that were disconnected (Mobile Number Revocation List - MNRL) to the following stakeholders, creating a network of checks and balances. They are:

1. Intelligence from Non-Banking Finance Companies, and UPI (Unified Payment Interface) gateways.
2. The Chakshu facility- a feature on the Sanchar Saathi portal that enables users to report suspected fraudulent communication (Calls, SMS, WhatsApp messages), which has also been roped in.
3. Complaints from the National Cybercrime Reporting Portal (NCRP) through the I4C (Indian Cyber Coordination Center).

Some other initiatives taken up concerning securing against digital financial fraud are the Citizen Financial Cyber Fraud Reporting and Management System, the International Incoming Spoofed Calls Prevention System, among others.

A United Stance

The ease of payment and increasing digitisation might have enabled the increasing usage of UPI platforms. However, post-adoption, the responsibility of securing the digital payments infrastructure becomes essential. As per a report by CNBC TV18, UPI fraud cases surged by 85% in FY24. The number of incidents have increased from 7.25 lakh in FY23 to 13.42 lakh in FY24. These cases involved a total value of ₹1,087 crore, compared to ₹573 crore in the previous year, and the number continues to increase. 

Nevertheless, UPI platforms are taking their own initiative to combat such crimes. PhonePe, one of the most used digital payment interface as of January 2025 (Statista) has already incorporated the FRI into its PhonePe Protect feature; this blocks transactions with high-risk numbers and issues a warning prior to engaging with numbers that are categorised to be of medium risk. 

CyberPeace Insights

The launch of a feature addressing the growing threat of financial fraud is crucial for creating a network of stakeholders to coordinate with law enforcement to better track and prevent crimes. Publicity of these measures will raise public awareness and keep end-users informed. A secure infrastructure for digital payments is necessary in this age, with a robust base mechanism that can adapt to both current and future threats.

References

• https://www.thehawk.in/news/economy-and-business/centre-launches-financial-fraud-risk-indicator-to-safeguard-mobile-users
• https://telanganatoday.com/government-launches-financial-fraud-risk-indicator-to-safeguard-mobile-users
• https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=2130249#:~:text=What%20is%20the%20%E2%80%9CFinancial%20Fraud,High%20risk%20of%20financial%20fraud
• https://www.business-standard.com/industry/news/dot-launches-financial-fraud-risk-indicator-to-aid-cybercrime-detection-125052101912_1.html 
• https://www.cnbctv18.com/business/finance/upi-fraud-cases-rise-85-pc-in-fy24-increase-parliament-reply-data-19514295.htm
• https://www.statista.com/statistics/1034443/india-upi-usage-by-platform/#:~:text=In%20January%202025%2C%20PhonePe%20held%20the%20highest,key%20drivers%20of%20UPI%20adoption%20in%20India
• https://telecom.economictimes.indiatimes.com/amp/news/policy/centre-notifies-draft-rules-for-delicensing-lower-6-ghz-band/121260887?nt

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Introduction
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India’s data centre sector is rapidly emerging as strategic national infrastructure at the centre of the country’s AI ambitions, fuelled by a combination of technological advancements and the global political economy. Estimates suggest that national data centre capacity is expected to rise from 1.2 GW in 2025 to almost 8 GW by 2030. With a funding of ₹10,372 crore, the IndiaAI Mission aims to establish domestic compute power and expand GPU infrastructure throughout the nation. Simultaneously, the Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act, 2023 has introduced a form of “soft localisation,” empowering the government to mandate domestic storage for sensitive categories of data.

Together, this push for infrastructure aims to transform India from a passive data market into an active shaper of global data flows. Yet India’s current policy model differs significantly from the approaches being adopted in other major digital economies. A comparison with Singapore and the European Union reveals that while India is focused on aggressive data centre expansion, other jurisdictions are increasingly prioritising sustainability, efficiency, and digital sovereignty.

This raises a critical policy question: can India scale its AI infrastructure ambitions while accounting for the governance and resource challenges that other markets are now attempting to correct?
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India’s Incentive-Led AI Infrastructure Push
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India’s current approach to data centre expansion is fundamentally facilitative. The state is acting as an enabler of rapid private investment through fiscal incentives and infrastructure prioritisation.

The Union Budget 2022 had classified data centres as “infrastructure,” which enables developers to access cheaper institutional financing and long-term capital. The Union Budget 2026 further introduced tax holidays for foreign cloud providers using Indian facilities for global operations. At the state level, governments such as Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh are aggressively competing to attract hyperscale investments through electricity duty exemptions, expedited approvals, and “essential service” status designed to guarantee uninterrupted operations.

This approach reflects India’s broader strategic positioning. As global demand for AI compute accelerates, India seeks to establish itself not only as a major digital market, but as a sovereign compute hub for the Global South.

The IndiaAI Mission demonstrates this ambition clearly. By seeking to scale domestic GPU capacity to 100,000 units, the government is recognising that compute infrastructure is increasingly becoming geopolitically strategic. AI leadership will now depend on the ability to control and secure the physical infrastructure powering advanced AI systems.

However, while India’s policy framework strongly incentivises capacity creation, it remains relatively underdeveloped in areas such as sustainability benchmarks, resource management, and operational accountability.
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Singapore and the European Union: Governance After Scale
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Singapore and the European Union offer models of digital infrastructure governance as rapid infrastructure growth starts to raise resource and sovereignty issues.

With the limited energy resources and land at its disposal, Singapore has shifted from unrestricted data centre growth to a tightly managed sustainability-first model. Through the Data Centre Call for Application (DC-CFA) framework, only projects meeting strict efficiency and economic value criteria are approved. For instance, new facilities are expected to maintain Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) levels of 1.3 or lower and submit detailed water efficiency plans to comply with advanced environmental standards. The country has also developed tropical cooling standards that allow facilities to run at higher ambient temperatures, reducing cooling energy consumption significantly. Rather than uninhibited growth, Singapore is now geared towards growth efficiency.

The European Union, on the other hand, is pursuing a sovereignty-oriented governance model in response to geopolitical pressures. However, it is still introducing energy reporting requirements and waste heat recovery rules into digital infrastructure rules through the revised Energy Efficiency Directive and proposed EU Cloud and AI Development Act. Simultaneously, the Digital Markets Act (DMA) is being used to investigate hyperscale cloud providers for potential “gatekeeper” behaviour, reflecting concerns about excessive concentration of digital infrastructure power in the hands of a few non-European firms. This approach shows that sovereignty and energy efficiency can go hand-in-hand.

These models illustrate an important trend: digital infrastructure governance is shifting from the promotion of investment to sustainability, competition regulation and strategic autonomy.
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India’s Emerging Governance Challenge
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India’s current trajectory and global geopolitical tensions suggest that pressures regarding sustainability and sovereignty are set to intensify over the next decade.

AI infrastructure is resource-intensive by design. For example, a single modern AI server rack can consume up to 250 kilowatts (kW) of power, compared to a traditional enterprise server rack which typically requires only 15 kW. Despite the use of water use effectiveness (WUE) technologies, the sheer volume of heat transfer means that AI data centres can still put immense pressure on local water resources, especially in warmer climates. These figures juxtaposed against hyperscale clusters mean the volumes of electricity, cooling systems, land, water, and high-density compute rise by significant orders of magnitude.  Yet most Indian policies remain overwhelmingly focused on fiscal incentives rather than long-term resource governance.

This creates the risk of a reactive policy cycle in which sustainability standards are introduced only after resource pressures become acute. Urban concentration, grid stress, water scarcity, and energy reliability may eventually force abrupt regulatory interventions which can lead to higher compliance costs and uncertainty in operations.

At the same time, India’s push for sovereign AI infrastructure also raises broader questions around digital sovereignty and institutional capacity. Procuring GPUs alone does not create an AI ecosystem. Secure hosting environments, skilled infrastructure personnel, cybersecurity preparedness, and interoperable governance mechanisms are equally essential.

This makes workforce development a strategic human resource development issue rather than simply an industrial challenge. Without sufficient thermal engineers, cybersecurity professionals, and digital infrastructure specialists, India’s infrastructure ambitions may struggle to translate into long-term resilience.
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Building Governance into the Expansion Phase
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India’s current “pre-regulatory” moment also presents a significant opportunity. Because the sector is still evolving, both policymakers and infrastructure actors have the ability to shape governance standards before constraints become restrictive.

It is vital to establishing national sustainability benchmarks through public-private technical partnerships, possibly under the aegis of of NITI Aayog, the Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE) and MeitY, before the next resource pressures dictate reactive regulation. Pilot “sustainability sandboxes” focused on liquid immersion cooling, renewable integration, battery energy storage systems, and water-efficient operations could help create evidence-based policy frameworks tailored to Indian conditions. Similarly, Likewise, collaborations with skilling institutions like NSDC and NIELIT can contribute to the development of dedicated digital infrastructure academies for thermal engineering, cybersecurity, and AI infrastructure management.

This would support India to progress towards a sovereign AI infrastructure stack, bringing together compute capacity, sustainability, capacity building and governance resilience into a seamless ecosystem.
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Conclusion
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With AI systems become increasingly utilised in finance, healthcare, governance, and public services, the infrastructure ecosystem supporting them will become equally politically and strategically significant. The choices India makes today to operationalise sustainability, skilling, competition, and sovereign compute capacity will shape the foundations of its future AI economy.

The central challenge is no longer whether India can become a major AI infrastructure hub. It is whether the country can transition from an incentive-led expansion model toward a governance framework that balances scale with sustainability, sovereignty, democratic accountability, and long-term resilience.

That transition may ultimately define the success of India’s AI century.
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References
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https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/info-tech/economic-survey-indias-data-centre-capacity-to-reach-about-8-gw-by-2030/article70566326.ece

https://indiaai.gov.in/news/cabinet-approves-india-ai-mission-at-an-outlay-of-rs-10-372-crore

https://vidhilegalpolicy.in/blog/cross-border-data-transfers-and-data-localization-mandate-under-the-data-protection-regime/

https://www.sttelemediagdc.com/in-en/resources/what-does-infrastructure-status-mean-data-centre-industry

https://www.midcindia.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/IT-ITES_Policy_2015.pdf

https://uplc.up.gov.in/en/page/uttar-pradesh-data-center-policy

https://www.imda.gov.sg/resources/press-releases-factsheets-and-speeches/press-releases/2025/sg-it-energy-efficiency-standard-for-data-centres-launched

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Introduction 

Netflix is no stranger to its subscribers being targeted by SMS and email-led phishing campaigns. But the most recent campaign has been deployed at a global scale, affecting paid users in as many as 23 countries according to cybersecurity firm Bitdefender. In this particular campaign, attackers are using the carrot-and-stick tactic of either creating a false sense of urgency or promising rewards to steal financial information and Netflix credentials. For example, users may be contacted via SMS and told that their account is being suspended due to payment failures. A fake website may be shared through a link, encouraging the individual to share sensitive information to restore their account. Once this information has been input, it is now accessible to the attackers. This can create significant stress and even financial loss for its users. Thus, they are encouraged to develop the necessary skills to recognize and respond to these threats effectively.

How The Netflix Scam Works 

Users are typically contacted through SMS. Bitdefender reports that these messages may look something like this:

"NETFLIX: There was an issue processing your payment. To keep your services active, please sign in and confirm your details at: https://account-details[.]com"

On clicking the link, the victim is directed to a website designed to mimic an authentic user experience interface, containing Netflix’s logo, color scheme, and grammatically-correct text. The website uses this interface to encourage the victim to divulge sensitive personal information, such as account credentials and payment details. Since this is a phishing website, the user’s personal information becomes accessible to the attacker as soon as it is entered. This information is then sold individually or in bundles on the dark web.

Practical Steps to Stay Safe 

1. Know Netflix’s Customer Interface: According to Netflix, it will never ask users to share personal information including credit or debit card numbers, bank account details, and Netflix passwords. It will also never ask for payment through a third-party vendor or website.
2. Verify Authenticity: Do not open links from unknown sources sent by email or sms. If unsure, access Netflix directly by typing the URL into the browser instead of clicking on links in emails or texts. If the link has been opened, do not enter any information.
3. Use Netflix’s Official Support Channels: Confirm any suspicious communication through Netflix’s verified help page or app. Write to phishing@netflix.com with any complaints about such an issue.
4. Contact Your Financial Institution: If you have entered your personal information into a phishing website, you should immediately reach out to your bank to block your card and change your Netflix password. Contact the authorities via www.cybercrime.gov.in or by calling the helpline at 1930 in case of loss of funds.
5. Use Strong Passwords and Enable MFA/2FA: Users are advised to use a unique, strong password with multiple characters. Enable Multi-Factor Authentication or  Two Factor Authentication to your accounts, if available, to add an extra level of security.

Conclusion

Phishing campaigns which are designed to gather customer data through fraudulent means often involve sending links to as many users as possible, with the aim of monetizing stolen information. Attackers exploit user trust in online platforms to steal sensitive personal information, making such campaigns more sophisticated as highlighted above. This underscores the need for users of online platforms to practice good cyber hygiene by verifying information, learning to detect suspicious information and ignoring it, and staying aware of the types of online fraud they may be exposed to. 

Sources 

• https://www.bitdefender.com/en-gb/blog/hotforsecurity/netflix-scam-stay-safe
• https://help.netflix.com/en/node/65674
• https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/technology/tech-news/netflix-users-beware-this-netflix-subscription-scam-is-active-in-23-countries-how-to-spot-one-and-stay-safe/articleshow/115820070.cms