BENGALURU: A 25-year-old woman, who agreed to switch her mobile phone SIM card to eSIM, lost Rs 3 lakh to fraudsters who allegedly applied for a Rs 10 lakh loan in her name and siphoned off Rs 3 lakh.
Prachi Awasthi, a resident of Kannamangala, filed a complaint with the police two days after the incident, which occurred between July 9-11. On July 9, around 10.30 am, she got a call from a man who claimed to be a customer care representative of her telecom service provider.
He told her that he was converting her physical SIM to eSIM. She agreed and he asked her to send a text messages to a number. As soon as she did so, her phone number got blocked. “The woman started getting One Time Passwords (OTP) to her e-mail ID from her bank to initiate online fund transfer. Suspecting foul play, she approached the nearest branch of the bank.
Explaining the situation to the staff, she asked them to block her bank account, as transactions were being done without her consent. To her surprise, she learnt that a loan of Rs 10 lakh had been applied for from her account via online banking and the amount was credited to her account. The fraudsters had also transferred Rs 3 lakh to other bank accounts through net banking. The bank then blocked her account and her debit card, police said. Police suspect that the miscreants stole the data related to her bank account and could have cloned her SIM to access OTPs sent from the bank.