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By:

Bhaskar Nath Biswal

13 May 2026 at 8:30:30 pm

E-Commerce’s Hidden Threat

The modern Indian marketplace no longer echoes exclusively with the chaotic bustle of traditional bazaars. Instead, it thrives within the silent, instantaneous clicks of smartphone screens. From monthly groceries to high-end electronics, digital retail has fundamentally altered how households across the country consume goods. This transition has undoubtedly unleashed unprecedented convenience, democratizing access to products for millions living outside metro cities. However, this...

E-Commerce’s Hidden Threat

The modern Indian marketplace no longer echoes exclusively with the chaotic bustle of traditional bazaars. Instead, it thrives within the silent, instantaneous clicks of smartphone screens. From monthly groceries to high-end electronics, digital retail has fundamentally altered how households across the country consume goods. This transition has undoubtedly unleashed unprecedented convenience, democratizing access to products for millions living outside metro cities. However, this hyper-connected landscape has also exposed a deeply troubling reality. As digital storefronts expand, so does the shadowy ecosystem of cybercriminals eager to exploit the trust and vulnerabilities of unsuspecting shoppers. The digital transaction, once celebrated as a triumph of modern engineering, is increasingly fraught with unseen hazards. Protecting consumers from e-shopping fraud has now become an urgent national imperative. Fraud Surge The sheer scale of India’s e-commerce revolution provides vital context for why online shopping has become such a high-stakes arena. Recent market estimates indicate that India’s e-commerce economy has surged well beyond $140 billion, driven by over 300 million active digital shoppers. Projections show this user base rapidly swelling toward 400 million, largely fuelled by deep internet penetration, affordable smart phones and seamless payment infrastructure like the Unified Payments Interface across Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities. Yet, this remarkable surge in commercial volume has been mirrored by an equally dramatic escalation in cybercrime statistics. Official records from the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal reveal that citizens have filed over 3.8 million cyber fraud complaints, representing staggering financial losses exceeding Rs. 36,000 crore, with a significant portion stemming from fraudulent online retail schemes. Perhaps most alarming is the historical recovery rate, where less than one percent of stolen funds is successfully returned to victims once transactions cross cyber borders. Despite the pervasive presence of online threats, digital consumers frequently fall into predictable traps that expose them to severe risk. A primary misstep is the failure to maintain basic password hygiene, with millions of shoppers reusing weak or identical passwords across multiple e-commerce platforms and email accounts, enabling attackers to execute swift cascading breaches. Furthermore, shoppers frequently bypass critical verification steps in pursuit of speed, such as failing to verify whether a website domain uses secure, encrypted connections before typing in card credentials. Another widespread oversight is performing financial transactions over unsecured public Wi-Fi networks in cafes or transport hubs, which allows bad actors to intercept sensitive data packets in transit. Many consumers also neglect regular software updates on their smartphones, leaving unpatched security vulnerabilities wide open to malware. Above all, emotional urgency remains the greatest weakness. Impulsive buyers frequently ignore glaring red flags, such as suspicious payment requests or unverified seller profiles. Decoding Scams Recognizing that awareness is the frontline of defence, key industry players and digital safety advocates have begun taking structured action. A prominent example is the consumer handbook, ‘Your Guide to Safe Online Shopping’, developed by Safer Internet India and commissioned by Amazon. The initiative aims to demystify complex cyber security concepts and provide consumers with actionable, real-world tools to navigate the digital marketplace safely. The handbook shines a bright light on the most prevalent fraudulent tactics currently plaguing buyers. To combat these threats, the safety guide emphasizes a multi-layered approach to consumer protection. It urges shoppers to verify web addresses meticulously, refrain from sharing one-time passwords and avoid conducting transactions off authorized brand platforms. Equally important, the guide bridges the gap between technical vigilance and legal empowerment by outlining explicit consumer rights under Indian laws and detailing formal grievance redressal mechanisms. A sustainable defence against online shopping fraud requires an integrated, multi-stakeholder strategy that aligns consumer awareness, corporate accountability and robust law enforcement. E-commerce platforms must continue investing aggressively in advanced artificial intelligence tools to detect cloned websites, eliminate fake merchant accounts and intercept suspicious payment flows before they reach consumers. Concurrently, regulatory authorities and law enforcement agencies must strengthen real-time intervention frameworks, expanding initiatives like the 1930 cyber crime helpline and emergency account-freezing protocols to minimize financial damage when breaches happen. On the demand side, continuous public awareness campaigns, modelled after comprehensive handbooks, must reach deep into semi-urban and rural regions where first-time internet users are most susceptible to manipulation. Ultimately, building a safe digital shopping environment is about preserving trust. Only when digital literacy keeps pace with technological innovation can India truly reap the economic rewards of its e-commerce revolution without sacrificing the security of its citizens. (The writer is a former college Principal and Founder of Supporting Shoulders, an Odisha-based non-profit Trust. Views personal.)

AI Is Not a Cure. It’s a Diagnostic

Last week, a founder in Thane said something I’ve heard in many forms before:

“Just tell me which AI tool to buy. I want this chaos to reduce.”


It was late at night. He wasn’t chasing transformation. He was exhausted. His day had been a loop of follow-ups, escalations, customer confusion, internal debates, and one more “urgent” that became urgent only because nothing moved on time.


And then AI appears. A tool that writes, summarises, replies, plans. A tool that sounds calm and confident even when your business isn’t. So, I understand the rush. In 2026, AI feels like the first technology wave that promises relief, not just efficiency. But here’s the uncomfortable truth: AI won’t cure a messy system. It will scan it. And the scan results are rarely pleasant.


AI For Relief

Founders don’t chase AI because they love technology. They chase it because they want mental breathing room. They’re tired of being the human glue. Tired of confirming everything. Tired of fixing what should have been fixed by the system.

AI feels like a shortcut to maturity because it produces the appearance of order:

clean emails, neat summaries, structured plans

But appearances have fooled SMEs before.


Emotional Pattern

If you’ve been in business long enough, you’ve seen this cycle repeat: ERP promised control. SaaS promised visibility. Automation promised speed. AI now promises thinking. Each wave arrives with the same hope: “This will reduce our dependence on people.”


And each wave disappoints the same way because the tool lands on top of a system that was never stabilised. For a few weeks, things look better.


Then the old sentence returns: “We bought the tool. Why is nothing changing?”

Because tools don’t eliminate ambiguity. They scale it. AI just scales it faster.


Exposing Gaps

Here’s the clean reframe: AI is an MRI scan for your business.

An MRI doesn’t heal you. It shows you what’s happening under the surface.

AI does the same quickly and without politeness. It reveals four gaps founders often carry quietly.


First, unstable processes. In many SMEs, the process isn’t documented. It lives in someone’s head … often the founder’s or the “best performer’s.” When work isn’t done the same way twice, AI can’t help. It can only guess. So proposals look polished, but delivery doesn’t match. Not because anyone is dishonest, but because there is no single way of working.


Second, untrusted data. Ask a simple question like, “What price did we promise this customer?” and you’ll get different answers from sales, accounts, old spreadsheets, and memory. AI doesn’t fix this. It produces confident outputs from inconsistent inputs. Founders then step back in to verify. The load doesn’t reduce, it just changes shape.


Third, unclear decision rights. Most SMEs don’t suffer from lack of ideas. They suffer from lack of closure. No one knows who can decide, what “good enough” means, or when a decision is final. AI adds options but without decision ownership, options become noise.


Finally, trust debt. This is when the real company runs on side calls, personal favours, and WhatsApp war rooms. AI can make replies faster, but it can’t create trust. When trust is weak, speed only makes the cracks louder. Customers don’t want faster words. They want reliable outcomes.


A Small Confession. I’ve felt this temptation myself … the hope that a smarter tool might clean up complexity. But every durable improvement I’ve seen in SMEs started somewhere far less glamorous: One workflow stabilised, one ownership clarified, one source of truth agreed, one review rhythm installed.


Only after that does technology create leverage. Before that, it creates theatre.

Using Insight


This is not an argument against AI. It’s an argument for sequence. Use AI as a diagnostic, not as medicine. Don’t ask, “Which tool will fix us?” Ask, “What does AI reveal about us?” Then fix the foundation. Because the businesses that win in 2026 won’t be the ones that adopted AI first. They’ll be the ones whose systems were mature enough to hold the speed.


One Question

If AI made your business twice as fast tomorrow. What would break first? If you already know the answer, you already know where the real work is.


(The writer is Co-founder at PPS Consulting. He works with founders and second-generation leaders to design operating systems where growth strengthens people, not exhausts them.)

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