CHENNAI: A 21-year-old ex-employee of a private digital payment company allegedly swindled lakhs of rupees by sticking QR codes in front of small shops along the Old Mahabalipuram Road. The accused had a novel modus operandi — he linked the codes to the bank account of one of his friends and pasted them over the existing QR codes of the shops.
Police said the accused had received the QR codes when he was working with the company. After he quit, he had stuck the codes in front of shops in the night hours without the knowledge of the shopkeepers. He had taken advantage of the fact that many shopkeepers would not be frequently checking if they receive small amounts of money.
According to the police, the accused C Vallarasu from Kallukuttai joined as a business development executive at PhonePe. Police said that Vallarasu had to convince shopkeepers along the Old Mahabalipuram Road (OMR), from Perungudi to Karapakkam, to use QR codes provided by PhonePe. “The QR codes would be stuck in front of the shops to receive payments from customers,” said a police officer.
In March this year, Vallarasu quit his job, but had at least 460 QR code stickers with him, said a police officer. In order to make money, Vallarasu hatched a plan. Since he knew the shops that have PhonePe QR codes, Vallarasu would stick a QR code connected to his friends’ account on top of the ones that already exist, said the police.
“Vallarasu started doing this at night. Many shopkeepers don’t check their phone if someone pays Rs 10 or Rs 20 and Vallarasu used this to his advantage. He would keep the stickers for up to three days and later remove them before moving to another shop,” said a police officer.
Police said that Vallarasu’s friend Srinivasan did not know that his bank account was being used by Vallarasu to swindle lakhs of rupees. Vallarasu and his friend S Robert (32) from Adyar were nabbed during a vehicle check on Sunday morning and remanded.