FPJ Cyber Secure: Woman Loses ₹7.8 Lakh To Online Fraudsters

Mumbai: A 48-year-old woman working for Tata Consultancy Services has become the latest victim of task-based cyber fraud, which cost her ₹7.8 lakh, police said on Sunday.

The victim, a resident of Subhash Nagar in Andheri (East), received a text message on July 20 offering her a part-time job providing ‘ratings’ on Google for private companies. Sindhu (name changed) thought it was a good way to earn extra cash, and approached them via the Telegram app.

Immediately after joining the two channels named @ZzMithran and @ZzAshvil, she was told to provide her bank account details, after which she was paid ₹200 as the joining amount. The next day, July 21, she was told to send ₹1,000 for a prepaid task and promised a return amount of ₹1,300 after its completion. For the next task, Sindhu paid ₹5,000, and after the completion, she received ₹6,600. She was then told to pay ₹5,000, but despite completing the task, she was not paid the amount back.

Fraudsters assured woman that they would double the amount

When Sindhu asked them about the payment, she was asked if she was interested in trading. When she said yes, she was asked to pay ₹27,000. The fraudsters assured her that they would double the amount, but no such thing happened. When she asked them about the ₹27,000, she was told to pay ₹60,000, in order to release all the amount to her bank account. But yet again, they did not pay her anything.

On July 22, they texted her on Telegram saying there was some error in her trading account for which she needs to pay ₹1 lakh. She did, and some hours later she received a text message saying her trading loan had been approved, so she needed to pay ₹1.39 lakh. Then she was told via Telegram that her ‘trading rating’ had dropped, so to bring it back to normal, she would have to pay ₹2 lakh. Though she realised that after spending so much money, not a single amount had been credited to her account, she believed she would sooner or later.

Fraudsters manipulate victim into paying repeatedly, doubling the amount

The fraudsters again asked her to pay ₹2.43 lakh as they need to pay taxes to the government for trading and investments. Even though she paid ₹2.43 lakh, and it was debited from her account, they gaslighted her and convinced her that they did not receive the payment. They asked her to make the payment again, and instead of ₹2.43 lakh, they told her to pay ₹3.15 lakh. Sindhu was told in the beginning that all the payments would be doubled and credited to her account, but all the scamsters did was make her pay more.

In the end, Sindhu realised she had paid them ₹7.8 lakh and got nothing in return. A couple of days later, she approached the police and narrated the entire incident, even providing copies of transactions made from her three bank accounts. The MIDC police have initiated a probe into the matter.