Mumbaikars are being duped out of lakhs by conmen calling from Pakistan who promise victims they have won a lottery on the game show Kaun Banega Crorepati
Hum Kaun Banega Crorepati se bol rahe hai. Aapke SIM card par 25 lakh rupaye ki lottery lagi hai. Amitabh Bachhan ji ne lucky draw me jo SIM card nikala hai wo apke naam par hai.
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If you get a call like this, beware. This call is the gateway to a windfall not for you, but for fraudsters calling all the way from Pakistan, hoping to dupe unsuspecting people out of lakhs.
Amitabh Bachhan-ji ne lucky draw mein jo SIM card nikala hai woh aapke naam par hai -- What the conman told us when mid-day called posing as a quizzer
Mumbai Police has lately been swamped with complaints from citizens who were similarly swindled by callers claiming to work with the popular reality show Kaun Banega Crorepati (KBC). But as to who is responsible for the scam, the cops have not been able to get to the bottom of it.
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Modus operandi
The fraudsters call from phone numbers starting from +92 or 0092, the area code for Pakistan. Since these numbers are operated from overseas, the police has limited options. The only thing they can do in such cases is to try and trace the money trail to the beneficiaries. However, even this resulted in a dead end. “Generally, investigation of such cases ends with the beneficiaries, as the phone numbers are destroyed soon after the fraud is pulled off. But even the bank accounts turned out to be mule accounts,” said Brijesh Singh, inspector general (Cyber) of Maharastra police.
Mule accounts belong to innocent people who are conned into accepting the money transfer on behalf of the fraudster. When the cops finally zero in on the account holder, he or she realises that they were unwitting participants in a scam.
Explaining the modus operandi further, a police officer handling one such case said that callers initially win the trust of the target by giving them a 4-digit number. The ccaller asks the victim to check whether the number matches with the digits on their SIM card. Victims are shocked when they see that the numbers match, and instantly fall for the con. “This is a trick. Callers are aware of some technical information, usually available with those associated with cellular service companies. Fraudsters use this information very well and give it to victims for verification, and the victims fall for it,” said the officer. He added that the involvement of cellular companies cannot be ruled out either.
After gaining victim’s trust, the fraudsters start their real game. Under various pretexts, they ask the victims to transfer money to them before the lottery winnings can be released. One of the excuses they use is that transfers have to be made for tax payments. In another case, the fraudsters asked a victim to transfer the money if he wanted KBC host Amitabh Bachchan to sign the lottery cheque.
Security threat
Such methods can not only be used for fraud but also to generate funds for anti-national activities and terror attacks. A senior IPS officer of the state police admitted that the situation is vulnerable. However, the issue has failed to provoke the concern it deserves.
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