KOCHI: The Kochi mayor is the latest target of cyber fraudsters as his Facebook account was hacked twice last month by unidentified people. The Kochi cyber police have registered two separate cases following cyber fraud on Mayor M Anil Kumar in September.
The first incident took place between September 1 and 14. A fake Facebook profile was created using the mayor’s display picture from his official page. “The scammers then sent messages to several people, requesting money. The accused asked them to send the amount to 9134046426 using UPI. I decided to file a complaint so that no one will lose money,” the mayor said.
The second cyber attack took place between September 28 and 29. The mayor operates an official Facebook page, M Anil Kumar, and a personal account, Adv Anil Kumar. Both these accounts were hacked. The display picture on the official page was changed to the family photo of an unknown person on Sunday morning.
“The access to the page and the account are not yet retrieved. The person who hacked the official page is posting pictures,” he said. Anil said that the cyber police officials suspect his password was leaked through other sources.
“While contesting in the 2016 assembly elections, I was assisted by a team who also handled my social media handles, including my Facebook account. The officials suspect that the scammers accessed the password after hacking the computer of any person who used my social media accounts. The team is attempting to retrieve the accounts as soon as possible,” he said. The mayor requested the public to ignore unwanted messages sent from his account during these days.