Two senior citizens lose over Rs 65 lakh in digital arrest fraud

Hyderabad: Two senior citizens from the city reported a loss of Rs 65.5 lakh in two separate digital arrest cases registered at Cyberabad cybercrime police station on Wednesday.In the first case, a 67-year-old victim from Kompally received a call on April 24 from unknown persons posing as Delhi police officers. The callers told him that a money laundering case was registered against him in the national capital. “They claimed that an ICICI Bank account was opened with my identity particulars and an amount of Rs 8 crore was routed through the account,” the complainant alleged.Threatening to arrest the victim, the fraudsters told the victim to transfer money from his bank account for RBI verification to prove his innocence and avoid arrest.

Believing them to be genuine officers, the victim transferred Rs 38 lakh between May 11 and 13 to the bank accounts provided by the accused.In the second case, a 65-year-old retired employee from Kukatpally told police that he received a call on March 31 from a person claiming to be from the Data Protection Board of India. The caller claimed that a complaint was filed against the victim’s wife and him over Aadhaar misuse and connected the call to fraudsters posing as cops from Colaba police station in Mumbai.

“The fraudsters claimed that some bank accounts opened with my Aadhaar credentials were linked to an international terrorism funding case. They warned me not to disclose the matter to anyone and convinced me to transfer money from my account to their account for verification and court clearance,” the victim told police.Between April 13 and 18, he transferred over Rs 27.5 lakh to the bank accounts provided by the accused. Two separate cases were registered on the complaints of both the victims under relevant sections of the BNS and the IT Act on Wednesday.