Income Tax Dept. Introduces AI Portal to Track Tax Evaders and Digital Scams

The Income Tax Department is slowly moving towards Artificial Intelligence (AI) in its mission of uncovering tax evaders. The tax department has launched a new portal called Project Satya to analyse call data records and digital footprints in collaboration with the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT).

This system has already been used once in the past by the Investigation Wing in Bengaluru and will soon likely be introduced in the entire country. According to the department, the system is designed to identify unseen connections between individuals and entities that are not possible to capture using indigenous financial records.

In accordance with the people aware of this new system, Project Satya helps investigators identify the following:

• Can be used to track 10 applications commonly used by evaders in performing scams, including WhatsApp, Telegram, and Signal.
• Helps in identifying the main IP addresses a suspect uses, helping spot patterns in their online behaviour.
• Use mobile tower data to check where a suspect was physically located.
• Create a detailed digital profile of each suspect, including app usage, communication links, and summaries.

This system can also be used to identify “sandwich calls”, which are short calls hidden between longer ones that might indicate secret communication. The system emphasises unusual activities at odd hours, looks at the shortest and longest calls, and can also detect OTP (one-time password) transfers, which is the key warning indication of any financial fraud taking place.

The system is also developed to flag the last call of the day; this helps investigators understand the call patterns of the data. Importantly, now investigators can analyse a case in minutes, unlike earlier, when it took hours in manual analysis.

Many people have questions in their minds regarding the Satya Project, like, will it now harm the personal privacy of people when call data is used in investigations? Officials say that the new system does not give them any extra access. The tax department already collects call records, but only following legal rules and only for cases under investigation.

They say Project Satya is designed to make investigations more accurate and efficient, helping build stronger cases with solid evidence while staying within the law. For the CBDT, the project shows a move toward AI-based tax enforcement. By linking digital activity with financial records, the department wants to make it harder for tax evaders to get away. An email from NDTV Profit asking the CBDT for confirmation and rollout details of the project did not get a reply.