A senior official at the BARC lost Rs 4.3 lakh in 43 transactions to a cyber-fraudster in just 23 minutes. The complainant wanted to buy a laptop online and wanted to increase his debit card payment limit.
While surfing the internet, he came across the customer care number of his bank, which turned out to be a fraud number. The ‘customer care executive’, on the pretext of helping the victim, sent a phishing link to the victim and managed to siphon money from his bank account.
The Trombay police said the complainant, who is a resident of Anushakti Nagar, wanted to purchase a laptop online and was surfing for something that fit his requirements on an e-commerce website in January this year.
As the online payment to purchase the laptop was getting declined, the complainant searched for the customer care number of the bank where he has an account. "He came across a number and requested the customer care executive to increase his debit card limit," a police officer said.
The officer said the fraudster sent him a phishing link and asked for his bank account details. He induced the complainant to share an OTP that came on his phone. The man then started getting transaction alerts after which he realized that he was being duped. By the time he got in touch with his bank and got his debit card blocked, he had lost Rs 4.3 lakh in 43 transactions of Rs 10,000 each.
The police last week registered an offense under sections 34 (common intention), 419 (punishment for cheating by personation) and 420 (cheating) of the Indian Penal Code and sections 66C (punishment for identity theft) and 66D (punishment for cheating by personation by using computer resource) of the Information Technology Act.
