Noida, 2 Dec: The Uttar Pradesh Police Department has initiated a probe after a Noida resident was tricked of more than Rs 11 lakh and placed under “digital arrest” for a day, according to police on Saturday.
This is the first case in the new trend of “digital arrest fraud” to be reported to the Noida Cyber Crime police station. The attackers pretended to be policemen, mentioning the names of an IPS officer in the CBI and the founder of a bankrupt airline, connecting the 50-year-old victim with a false money-laundering case.
A similar example was recently reported in Haryana’s Faridabad, when cyber bandits impersonating police officers “digitally arrested” a lady for more than a week. Cyber fraudsters convinced her that her personal identification cards were being utilized for illicit purposes. The goons then told her to stay online via Skype and not disclose this information with anybody, even though they were watching her the entire time.
In her complaint, the Noida-based woman claims that she was contacted over an IVR (interactive voice response) call on November 13 and told that a mobile phone SIM card was purchased using her Aadhaar card in Mumbai and used for illegal advertising and harassment of women. “Then my call was transferred to a person (who identified himself as a Mumbai Police officer) who did the initial interrogation over the call and then on Skype VC.”
“He then informed me that I have another allegation of money laundering related to (the founder of an airline) for which a FIR has been registered against me and an arrest warrant issued by the Supreme Court for which he sent documents via Skype,” the lady added.
“Following the interrogation, he stated that I am innocent and not guilty, so he is transferring the interrogation (to an IPS officer assigned to the CBI in Mumbai) for further investigation of this case. Then he provided me his Skype ID and instructed me to contact a CBI investigator to do a priority inquiry on VC in order to have my arrest warrant revoked,” she stated in her complaint.
According to the CBI investigator, during the investigation of the airline founder, authorities discovered 246 debit cards from his home, one of which had the victim’s name on it and was used to create a bank account with her Aadhaar card.
“He then stated that my account was used for a Rs 2 crore fund transfer for which I was paid Rs 20 lakh.” However, he stated, “I do not appear to be involved in this case, so in order to complete the investigation, I need to transfer funds from all of my accounts to my ICICI account, and then transfer funds from the ICICI account to the PFC account as per Supreme Court directives…”
The lady claims she was advised not to reveal this information because it was connected to “national security and would subject me to further action.” ?Also, to demonstrate that I was not guilty of the crime, he asked me to keep a sufficient balance in my accounts, for which he advised me to apply for a personal instant loan of Rs 20 lakh from ICICI and gave the details of how to apply for the same, which I denied, but he forced me to arrange Rs 3 lakh more through the same and, after much pressure, I had applied for the same, which was also transferred to the PFC account, she said.
She claims that they also grabbed a photo of her signature on Skype under the guise of confirming her Aadhaar card for inquiry. The lady reported the incident to Uttar Pradesh Police’s Cyber Crime officers, alleging a Rs 11.11 lakh scam with her, as well as being “digitally arrested” from morning to night. Inspector Reeta Yadav, in-charge of the Noida Sector 36 Cyber Crime police station, stated that a FIR has been filed under the relevant provisions of the Information Technology Act and the Indian Penal Code (IPC). “An investigation into the case is underway,” she told reporters.
The officer warned people to be wary of developing online crimes and to contact police as soon as possible, either by dialing the central hotline number 1930 or the emergency number 112, or by reporting such activity to the cyber desks at local police stations.
“People should also be aware that police never conduct digital interrogations. If someone threatens you like this, ask them to send you a legitimate notice, get their contact information, and tell them you’ll meet them at the police station,” Yadav said.
