Indore: Beware readers! If this has happened to a woman in the city, it can happen to one and all. A conman hacked a woman's Whatsapp messenger and sent (Whatsapp) messages to her relatives and friends asking money. Interestingly, the conman received monetary help from her kin. The woman has submitted a written complaint to Bhanwarkuan police station officials to identify the accused and to reactivate her Whatsapp messenger.
Bhanwarkuan police station incharge, Santosh Kumar Dudhi, said the woman, Anita Agrawal (name changed), a resident of Shubh City area, approached the police and lodged a complaint that she had received a phone call from a number (8102903690) around 11.25 am on Saturday.
The caller posed himself as an executive from the telecom company and he said, "You had placed a request to improve internet speed." The woman said she was facing slow internet speed for a couple of days. She assumed that the caller was from the telecom company.
Modus operandi: The caller told the woman that he could increase the internet speed of her mobile phone. Later, he had given his mobile number and told her to make a call on that number. The conman told her to use a number with a special character before his mobile number to make a phone call (*401*8102903690). The woman dialled the same after which her WhatsApp number got blocked. The conman, instead, used her WhatsApp and gave his bank account number to the woman's relatives and asked them to transfer money.
How she came to know about fraud?: She received a phone call from her relative, who informed her about her demand for money from her whatsApp number. She was shocked and told her relatives that, "My Whatsapp is not functioning then how can I demand money using the same? Also, she told the relative's that the account number received in the message does not belong to her. By then she was convinced that something horribly had gone wrong and her Whatsapp number had been hacked. She informed her husband and approached the police station and submitted a written complaint there.
A relative transferred Rs 6,000 to conman: The woman stated in her complaint that the conman managed to dupe one of her relative's of Rs 6000 after he sent a message with account number to the kin. The woman requested to identify the accused and to reactivate or unblock her Whatsapp number. Sources claimed that her relative resides in Kota and he had also lodged a complaint with the local police after the fraud came to light.
