SHIVAMOGGA: A 23-year-old woman was duped of Rs 4 lakh by fraudsters who posed as police officers from Mumbai investigating a supposed international parcel scam.
According to the complaint filed by the victim, the incident occurred on November 4, when she received a call from an unknown number. The caller claimed to be from FedEx and informed her that a parcel in her name, containing a laptop, five credit cards, and 420 grams of MDMA, was being sent from Mumbai to Iran.
The caller then transferred her to someone posing as a Mumbai Cyber Police officer. The fake officer instructed the woman to install the Skype app to record her statement. Following their guidance, she connected to an account labelled “MH0066OFFICIAL CYBER DEPARTMENT.”
They further claimed that her information had been leaked by an ICICI Bank employee.
The fake officer then prompted her to apply for an instant loan of Rs 3.8 lakh through the ICICI Bank mobile app. After the loan amount of Rs 3,75,281 was credited to her account, she was directed to transfer Rs 2 lakh each to two bank accounts, with the promise that the amount would be refunded within 15 minutes.
When the refund did not materialise, the woman became suspicious and lodged a complaint through the Cyber Crime Portal.
Jayanagara police have registered the case under the Information Technology Act, Section 66D (punishment for cheating by personation using computer resources), and the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, Sections 318(4) (cheating) and 319(2) (punishment for cheating by pretending to be someone else).