Fake NGO promises a baby for adoption, collects "registration" fees then vanishes
Fraudsters pose as NGOs offering children for adoption, collect escalating fees (registration, booking, transport) with forged hospital records, then cut off all contact. Only CARA handles legal adoption in India.
Also known as: online adoption scam India, fake NGO adoption fraud, child adoption fee scam, fake baby adoption racket
Already happened to you? Do this in the next few minutes
Call 1930 now- 1 Call 1930 — the national cyber-crime helpline — right now. The sooner you report, the better the chance of freezing the money before it moves.
- 2 Call your bank to freeze the account and block the card immediately. Use the number printed on your card, never a number from the message or caller.
- 3 File a report at cybercrime.gov.in and keep every message, screenshot, and transaction ID.
What to do right now
- 1 Verify any adoption agency through the official CARA portal at cara.wcd.nic.in before paying any fee — CARA lists every authorised agency
- 2 Never pay adoption-related fees via UPI or bank transfer to an individual or an unregistered NGO — all official fees are collected through the CARA portal itself
- 3 Do not accept or act on documents received via WhatsApp — forged hospital seals and NGO receipts are easy to produce and impossible to authenticate from a photo
- 4 If you have already paid money, do not pay any further instalments regardless of the documents or emotional pressure; each new fee is a sunk-cost trap
- 5 Collect all communication records (WhatsApp messages, call logs, bank transfer screenshots, documents received) before reporting — these are the primary evidence
- 6 Report at https://cybercrime.gov.in or call 1930 (national cyber helpline).
Red flags
- ⚠ Legitimate adoption in India is only through CARA (cara.wcd.nic.in) — any 'NGO' offering a baby outside CARA is running a scam
- ⚠ Multiple fee instalments (registration, booking, transportation) for a child adoption — real CARA adoptions have fixed, official fees payable through the portal only
- ⚠ The 'biological mother' is never available to meet in person, and every meeting request is deflected or postponed
- ⚠ Documents arrive via WhatsApp — forged NGO receipts, fake ultrasound reports, rubber-stamped hospital paperwork — but no CARA registration letter
- ⚠ Contact disappears once the final payment is made; calls go unanswered
Sources
- News4Hackers / Delhi Police — Delhi Police Bust Fake Adoption Racket Using Forged Medical Records (August 2026)
- OneIndia — Adoption Scam: Delhi Police Arrests 2 Men for Duping Rs 1.37 Lakh from Woman Over Promise of Baby Boy (August 2026)
- Millennium Post — Police Unearth Online Child Adoption Fraud, Apprehend 2 from UP (August 2026)
- Rashtriya Ujala Hindi — Online adoption ke naam par cyber thagi (August 6, 2026)