A 67-year-old Pune woman lost Rs 1.6 crore of her life savings to cyber crooks after receiving a call claiming that her phone number was used to send vulgar texts and that Mumbai police had arrested her.
She was issued an arrest order under the guise of a 'national security danger' and a 'Supreme Court case', and she was informed that disclosing her ordeal would result in the arrest of her children and seizure of their assets.
The deceptive call
The 67-year-old woman from Kothrud filed a First Information Report in the case at Pune's Cyber Crime Police Station earlier this week. In the first week of May, she received a call from a man posing as a Tilak Nagar police officer in Mumbai. While the individual presented himself as a sub-inspector, he used the identity of an IPS officer now stationed in Pune.
He informed her that vulgar messages had been sent from her phone number and requested her personal, financial, and Aadhar information for further clarity. He then stated that a 'FIR' had been registered in the 'Supreme Court' and that the charges included money laundering. The man said a CBI officer would call her and help.
The ‘fake’ CBI officer
The next day, she received a video call from a man pretending as a 'CBI officer' and providing the name of another working IPS officer. The officer informed her that to ensure that the money in her account was real and not used for money laundering, all funds from her account would have to be transferred to 'beneficiary accounts owned by the Reserve Bank of India.'
The officer informed her that the case against her was classified as 'national secrets' and that the account had been used to commit major crimes. Fearing legal repercussions, the victim made substantial transactions of Rs one crore and Rs 29 lakh from two separate accounts.
Coercion and surveillance: Imposing fear
During these transfers, the complainant was forced to remain on messenger calls, alleging she was under observation. The 'CBI official' informed her that if she shared the case with anyone in the family, her children would be detained and their possessions seized by the government. She was also instructed to make remittances of Rs 50 lakh to the 'Supreme Court.' The woman transferred more than Rs 30 lakh.
The aftermath
As the internet thieves increased their demands, the mother eventually confided in her daughter, who informed her that she had been duped by cybercriminals. She filed a complaint with the Cyber Crime Portal, and the case was then referred to the Cyber Crime Police Station in Pune City.
According to an officer from the Cybercrime Police Station, the crime's modus operandi is the same as that of drugs in parcel scams, but the grounds for threatening the victim differ. In a similar case recorded at Wakad police station in Pimpri Chinchwad, a software engineer in his 40s was duped of Rs 40 lakh after he was told that his number was being 'used to mistreat a woman' and threatened action under "national secret rule."
In these types of schemes, fraudsters mimic IPS personnel to defraud people. They pressure victims into transferring money for a variety of reasons, including customs taxes or legal expenses, as well as by saying that their bank accounts are under threat from hackers. Callers frequently threaten victims, stating they are under monitoring by the government.
