A cyber harassment complaint in India goes to cybercrime.gov.in or your local police station. Morphed or intimate images also go to the platform, which now has 2 hours to remove them. Loan app threats go to the lender and then RBI, or to Sachet if the app is unregistered, and a threatening number to Chakshu.
Listen to this article, about 12 minutes. A synthetic voice reads the article and announces each section title as it begins; tables are read row by row and the questions at the end are left out.
Recorded 14 November 2026 from the article as published that day. Press a chapter to jump there; the highlighted line is what is playing. A play button sits beside every section heading, and once you scroll past this player a bar at the bottom of the screen keeps the controls in reach. Tap or click any sentence to hear the reading start from there.
On this page: a table matching seven kinds of online harassment to the channel, the evidence and the time limit in each rule, the 2 hour removal rule from February 2026, RBI’s limits on recovery agents, and what ten people who faced this reported.
Think you already know this? Five questions, one minute.
Every answer is on this page. Answer from what you know now; the page fills in the rest.
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1. Under BNS section 78, what is the maximum prison term for stalking on a first conviction?
Section 78 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita sets up to three years on a first conviction and up to five on a second or later one. Read the section
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2. Under RBI’s 2022 circular, before what time in the morning may a recovery agent not call a borrower?
The RBI circular of 12 August 2022 bars calls before 8 a.m. and after 7 p.m., along with threats and messages to a borrower’s contacts. Read the section
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3. Since the February 2026 amendment, how quickly must a platform remove a morphed or intimate image after your complaint?
Rule 3(2)(b) of the IT Rules as updated on 10 February 2026 replaced 24 hours with two hours. Read the section
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4. In the May 2026 r/IndiaFinance account, how much did the app demand back within seven days for Rs 1,700 it credited unasked?
The poster on r/IndiaFinance said Rs 3,000 was due in seven days, followed by threats to message their contacts. This is one person’s report, not a finding. Read the section
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5. Under the RBI Integrated Ombudsman Scheme 2026, how long do you have to file once the lender’s 30 days have run out?
The RB-IOS 2026 FAQ sets 90 days from the expiry of that timeline or the lender’s last reply, whichever is later. The 2021 scheme allowed one year. Read the section
Harassment is the cyber crime where nobody has stolen money yet, so it falls between the cracks of the fraud guides. The good news is that the rules are sharper than most people assume, and two of them changed this year. The less good news is that each kind of harassment has its own door, and knocking on the wrong one costs days. This page sorts the doors.
Where do you file a cyber harassment complaint in India?
There is no single cyber harassment complaint form. There is a portal for crimes, a grievance system for platforms, a regulator for lenders and a telecom tool for numbers. The table below matches each situation to its channel, the evidence it asks for and the time limit written into its rules.
| What is happening | Where it goes | What to keep | Time limit in the rules | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Threats, abuse or stalking messages from a person | cybercrime.gov.in, or the local police station | Screenshots showing the sender’s profile link or number and the date | No filing deadline on the portal; file while the account still exists | cybercrime.gov.in; BNS section 78 |
| Morphed, nude or intimate images of you posted online | The platform’s grievance officer, plus cybercrime.gov.in | The post’s link and a screenshot, before you report it | Platform must remove within 2 hours of your complaint | IT Rules, rule 3(2)(b) |
| Other harassing content a platform will not take down | Grievance officer, then the Grievance Appellate Committee | The complaint number and the platform’s reply | Acknowledge in 24 hours, resolve in 7 days; appeal within 30 days of the reply | IT Rules, rules 3(2) and 3A |
| A bank or NBFC loan’s recovery agent threatening you or calling your contacts | The lender’s grievance cell first, then RBI’s complaint portal | Call log with times, messages, the agent’s name | Ombudsman after 30 days without a reply; file within 90 days | RBI circular, 12 Aug 2022; RB-IOS 2026 FAQ |
| An unregistered loan app threatening to message your contacts | cybercrime.gov.in and RBI’s Sachet portal | App name, payment IDs, every threat received | None stated | Sachet; PIB, 21 Jul 2026 |
| A threatening or sextortion call, SMS or WhatsApp, no money lost | Chakshu on Sanchar Saathi | The number and a screenshot | Report within 30 days | Chakshu page |
| A woman wanting the women’s commission to take it up | NCW online complaint, helpline 14490 | Your contact details, the respondent’s if known, documents | None stated | NCW complaint form; NCW contact page |
The portal, cybercrime.gov.in, has two tracks: one for crimes against women and children and one for other cyber crime. Guides to the portal say anonymous reporting covers only child sexual abuse material and rape content; we could not read the portal’s own page on this, because it loads as a script shell, so treat that as reported rather than confirmed. A harassment complaint needs your name and number.
If the harassment is stalking, section 78 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita covers a man who monitors a woman’s use of the internet, email or other electronic communication, with up to three years in prison on a first conviction and up to five on a second. The section is written for a woman as the person stalked. Anyone can still file; the police decide which sections apply.
Which channel takes this?
Pick what is happening. The answer names the channel and the time limit in its rules, as the official pages stated them on 14 November 2026. It does not assess your case.
If anyone threatens you with physical harm, call 112. Never pay a sextortion demand and never share an OTP with anyone offering to help.
What if a loan app is threatening to message your contacts?
This is the commonest version, and it splits in two depending on who lent the money. If the lender is a bank or an NBFC, RBI’s circular of 12 August 2022 says its recovery agents must not resort to intimidation or harassment of any kind. It names the tactics: publicly humiliating a borrower, intruding on the privacy of family, referees and friends, inappropriate messages on mobile or social media, threatening or anonymous calls, and calls before 8 a.m. or after 7 p.m.
Complain to the lender first and keep proof of it. Under the Integrated Ombudsman Scheme 2026, in force since 1 July 2026, you can go to RBI if the lender has not replied in 30 days or its reply does not satisfy you, and you must file within 90 days of that point on cms.rbi.org.in. The older scheme allowed a year, so anything written before July is now wrong on this. Filing is free.
If the app is not tied to any regulated lender, the ombudsman cannot help, because the scheme covers only the entities it lists. RBI has run a directory of digital lending apps on its website since 1 July 2025, according to a finance ministry reply of 21 July 2026, which also says MeitY has blocked 87 illegal loan apps. An app missing from that directory is not vouched for by any lender RBI regulates. Report it on Sachet and file at cybercrime.gov.in, since threatening to message your contacts is a crime, not a collection method.
An app that lends Rs 1,700 and asks for Rs 3,000 a week later has a creative view of interest. That is a real account, below. The threat is the product; the loan is the bait.
Morphed photo ya sextortion ho toh kya karein?
Pehle saboot save karo, phir report karo. Under the IT Rules as amended on 10 February 2026, a platform must remove content that exposes your private area, shows you nude or in a sexual act, or is an artificially morphed image of you within 2 hours of your complaint. Until February the limit was 24 hours. Anyone can complain on your behalf.
Other complaints to a platform’s grievance officer must be acknowledged within 24 hours and resolved within 7 days, down from 15. If the reply does not fix it, you can appeal to the Grievance Appellate Committee within 30 days of the grievance officer’s reply, under rule 3A of the same rules.
Do not pay a sextortion demand. Paying does not delete anything from the other person’s phone. File at cybercrime.gov.in, report the post to the platform, and report the number on Chakshu, whose page lists sextortion among the frauds it takes and asks for reports within 30 days.
How common is it? The communications ministry’s Rajya Sabha reply of 5 February 2026 counted Chakshu reports by category. Sextortion reports roughly doubled in a year.
| Category on the Chakshu form | 2024 | 2025 | 2026, to 5 Feb |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sextortion | 10,901 | 21,189 | 1,774 |
| Impersonation as police, CBI, customs, Aadhaar, RBI | 44,865 | 54,639 | 6,675 |
| Impersonation as a relative or friend | 258 | 19,564 | 1,201 |
What evidence should you save before you block anyone?
Every channel above asks for the same thing: proof that ties a message to a sender and a date. Do this first, while the account still exists.
- Screenshot every message with the date, time and the sender’s number or profile link visible. A screenshot of a chat with a display name and no link proves very little.
- Copy the link of any post or image before you report it, because a removed post takes its link with it.
- Do not delete the chat or block the number until you have saved everything. Blocking is fine afterwards.
- For a loan app, note the app’s name, the lender name it shows, and every UPI ID or account you paid to.
- Write down each complaint number you get: the portal acknowledgement, the platform ticket, the lender’s reference.
Before you block: evidence checklist
Tick each item as you save it. Every channel on this page asks for some of these.
Blocking is fine once all of this is saved.
What do people who filed a complaint actually report?
We read five Reddit threads from 2026 about harassment complaints and loan app threats. One was a moderators’ dispute and we left it out. The other four, posted in May and June 2026, carry about ten first hand accounts. These are what people report, not findings.
In a May 2026 thread on r/IndiaFinance, a user said an app they had only signed up for credited Rs 1,700 unasked and demanded Rs 3,000 within seven days, then threatened to send their photo to every contact. In the same thread, a commenter said an app sent Rs 617 after sign up and KYC, threatened them from a foreign number a week later, and went quiet after they refused to pay and filed a cyber crime complaint. Two others said ignoring the threats worked within days. One reply offered to sort it out by private message for free, which is how recovery scams usually open.
In a May 2026 post on r/IndianCyberHub, a user said a friend who repaid late was threatened with morphed images sent to his contacts, and that the callers barely reacted when he mentioned the police. The friend paid, the poster said.
On timelines the accounts agree, and not happily. A user who filed over threatening messages in June 2026 got encouragement, and a commenter replied that a complaint they filed in November 2025 had no lead eight months later. In a June 2026 thread asking how long the portal takes, one user had no update since February and another reported eight months without help.
Where this matches the official picture: the tactics people describe are the ones in RBI’s 2022 circular and in press coverage of illegal loan apps from December 2025, including morphed photos and messages to contacts. Where it departs: no rule gives a harassment complaint a deadline for police action, and the accounts suggest a fast acknowledgement followed by silence. The platform’s 2 hour clock is the fastest lever you have, which is why the report to the platform matters as much as the police complaint.
What happens after you file the complaint?
You get an acknowledgement number at once. The complaint is routed to the police with jurisdiction, who decide whether to register an FIR. Our guide to when a complaint becomes an FIR explains that step, and tracking your acknowledgement number covers what the status messages mean. Complaint ke baad local cyber cell se acknowledgement number ke saath follow up karna padta hai; waiting alone rarely moves it.
If money was also taken, the order changes: call 1930 first, because frozen money is time sensitive, then follow our 1930 and cybercrime.gov.in walkthrough. For a threatening number with no loss, reporting the number on Chakshu takes two minutes.
If anyone is threatening you with physical harm, or you feel unsafe, call 112. Do not meet a harasser, do not send more photos or documents, and do not share an OTP or your screen with anyone offering to help.
This page is general information, checked on 14 November 2026. It is not legal advice.
Frequently asked questions
Can I file a cyber harassment complaint without giving my name?
Guides to cybercrime.gov.in say anonymous reports are accepted only for child sexual abuse material and rape content. A harassment complaint needs your name and mobile number, and the NCW form marks the complainant’s contact details as mandatory.
Kya cyber harassment complaint ke liye FIR zaroori hai?
No. You file a complaint on the portal or at a police station, and the police decide whether it becomes an FIR. You do not need an FIR to ask a platform to remove content or to complain to a lender or RBI.
Is a loan app allowed to call the people in my contact list?
RBI’s 2022 circular bars the recovery agents of banks and NBFCs from intruding on the privacy of a borrower’s family, referees and friends. An app with no regulated lender behind it is not lending under RBI rules at all.
Instagram ya WhatsApp ne morphed photo nahi hataya toh kya karein?
Complain to the platform’s grievance officer, who must act on morphed or intimate images within 2 hours. If the reply does not fix it, appeal to the Grievance Appellate Committee within 30 days of that reply.
How long does a cyber harassment complaint take?
No published rule sets a deadline for police action on a harassment complaint. People who filed in 2025 and 2026 report waiting months without an update, so follow up with the district cyber cell using your acknowledgement number.
Can men file a cyber harassment complaint?
Yes. The portal’s other cyber crime section takes complaints from anyone. The stalking offence in section 78 of the BNS is written for a woman as the victim, so the police will pick other provisions where it does not fit.
Finished the page? The same five questions from the top, to see what stuck.
Platform rules and rates change without notice. This page was verified in November 2026 and is rechecked on the Sunday refresh. If you hit something different, tell us in the comments and we will update it.
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