By Mohammed Kudrati
A viral video purporting to show Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Shaktikanta Das, apparently cautioning against payment application fraud, is morphed.
The video is made in a way which purports to show Das advising against payment application fraud - more specifically committed through the misuse of apps like PhonePe, Google Pay (GPay) and PayTM - which offer payment services and are payment aggregators.
While the clip shows visuals of Das speaking, BOOM found that the audio and the original voice is of a YouTuber called Mausam Nagpal, where he is originally speaking about payment fraud awareness. The fake video uses a snipped footage of an announcement made by Das in May 2021, but has overlaid Nagpal's voice on it. The graphics also used in the video were shared by Nagpal.
Finally, towards the end of the video, the voice-over states a series of helpline numbers for PhonePe, Gpay and PayTM and a summary on the details to be provided by a user to get their account blocked in case they are victims of fraud.
The video can be seen below. BOOM received it on its helpline (7700906588) several times.
BOOM also found users sharing it on social media.
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FactCheck
BOOM broke down snippets of this video into keyframes and found that the underlying video was of Das' address on May 5, 2021.
In that address, which came during the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, Das highlighted a second tranche of relief measures for the economy and to support healthcare initiatives, like a ₹50,000 crore on-tap liquidity facility for banks to lend to healthcare and allied services and a new debt resolution scheme, among others.
A comparison of the morphed video with the original address as uploaded by the Reserve Bank of India can be found below. A transcript of the address is also available here. There is no mention by Das in this address to deal with fraud cases pertaining to PhonePe, GPay or PayTM.
Further, BOOM was also able to trace the source of the audio, which is by a YouTuber named Mausam Nagpal, through his channel, in the form of a short-form video. It can be seen below. Several of the graphics used by the morphed video can be traced used originally by Nagpal.
