Four cyber fraud cases reported in city; victims duped of over Rs 5 lakh

Indore: Indore police registered FIRs in four instances of cyber fraud. The scams involved fraudulent pension schemes, mobile hacking, deceptive customer support lines and fake social media advertisements, resulting in a total theft of more than Rs 5.65 lakh.In the Lasudia police station area, 75-year-old Akhilesh Gaikwad was duped of Rs 1.39 lakh. He received a call from an individual pretending to be a bank official and offered to issue a pension card. Having previously applied for one, Gaikwad trusted the caller and shared his banking credentials, card details and a live photograph. The suspect subsequently took remote control of the victim’s mobile device and executed three unauthorised transactions.Another resident of Lasudia, Gopal Wakde, lost Rs 1.42 lakh after his smartphone abruptly shut down. Upon restarting the device, Wakde discovered that Rs 44,000 was missing from his account. Subsequent verification at his bank branch revealed an additional unauthorised transaction of Rs 98,000.A student residing in Rajabag Colony, Pooja Jhamele, lost Rs 1.76 lakh to a fraudulent vehicle advertisement on Instagram. The advertisement offered a two-wheeler for Rs 25,000. After contacting the listed number, Jhamele was systematically induced to transfer funds across multiple instalments under the guise of booking fees, transportation costs and other administrative charges before realising the transaction was fake.

In another incident, a pharmaceutical trader, Nirmal Navalani, and his wife, Sharda, lost Rs 1.08 lakh. Navalani sought an internet contact number to cancel his OTT media subscriptions. The individual who answered the call posed as a customer support agent and directed Navalani to transfer a token amount of Rs 5 to initiate the cancellation process.Following the transfer via Google Pay, the phone screen went blank. The suspects managed to hack the device and processed four transactions from the couple’s separate bank accounts. The Juni Indore police are currently scanning the destination bank account details to trace the hackers.