Mumbai, March 4: A 70-year-old man fell prey to scammers and lost Rs 1.65 crore in a cryptocurrency investment fraud. The scammer befriended the complainant on Facebook and gradually convinced him to invest in cryptocurrency and induced him to download a bogus trading app and transfer money into different beneficiary bank accounts.
Victim befriended on Facebook
According to the police, the complainant is a resident of Jalgaon. On January 29, the complainant received a Facebook friend request from an unknown woman. The complainant accepted the said request, after which the duo started regularly chatting with each other.
During one of their conversations, the scammer informed the complainant about the benefits of cryptocurrency trading and a trading app through which trading and investments could be done.
Scammer induces victim to download trading app
The scammer then induced the complainant to download a trading app on his phone and, after initially receiving profits on his investments, the complainant trusted the trading platform and decided to invest further.
From February 9 till February 17, the scammer induced the complainant to transfer Rs 1.65 crore into different beneficiary bank accounts in ten online transactions.
Fake profits displayed on trading platform
Later, when the complainant checked his trading app, he realised that his earnings had reached Rs 3.91 crore.
The complainant then told the scammer, who he had connected with over Facebook, to help him withdraw his earnings from the trading app, after which the scammer told him to pay Rs 65.31 lakh more as a verification fee to get his money.
Scammer refuses to return money
Since the complainant did not have more money, he kept requesting the scammer to return his money, but the scammer kept giving evasive replies and refused to return his money until he paid Rs 65.31 lakh, police said.
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FIR registered in cyber fraud case
Having realised that he had been duped, the complainant raised a complaint on the cyber crime portal, following which an FIR has been registered under Section 318 (cheating) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and Section 66D (cheating by personation by using computer resource) of the Information Technology Act in the matter.
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