Hyderabad: A man was allegedly duped of Rs 90,000 on Friday by fraudsters posing as army officials as the victim attempted to sell furniture on a website.
The police said that the victim who is a lab technician at a private hospital received a phone call from an unidentified person claiming to be an army officer who showed interest in buying the furniture and asked for the victim’s bank details.
Soon after sharing the details, the victim realized that the amount was swiped from the account. The Kachiguda police registered a case, based on a complaint and the investigation is currently underway.
In October last year, the Cyber Crimes Wing of the Cyberabad police had issued a warning against fraudsters who generally posed as the army or paramilitary personnel and contact the person who is trying to sell a product on OLX, Quikr, or other websites.
Once both the parties lock a deal on to a certain price, the fraudster claims that they are posted in some inaccessible area of the country and hence cannot come to physically pick the delivery or pay in cash.
They gain the trust of the buyer by cashing in on some non-existent army identity and insist that the seller send money via UPI.
Then the fraudsters send a fake screenshot to the seller purporting to show that a transaction has been made to the seller’s account. The fraudster then brings out his/her last card of the play and guides the victim through the process by sending a QR code, which they claim can be used for receiving the money. The victim falls for it, scans the QR code, and enters the UPI pin to pay the amount rather than receiving it.