Mumbai: Cyber fraudsters pretending to be officials from the Delhi ATS and Jammu & Kashmir police duped a senior woman of Rs 22 lakh by falsely accusing her of spying for Pakistan, police said on Wednesday.
This incident marks the first reported case in the city where cyber criminals used espionage as a fake pretext to scam individuals, an officer noted.
The 64-year-old woman, residing in Girgaon, approached the South Region Cyber Police Station last week to report the incident.
According to her complaint, she received three calls earlier this month from unknown numbers. The caller claimed to be “Delhi ATS officer Prem Kumar Gupta,” supposedly posted at the Jammu and Kashmir Border Police Station.
The caller told her that a case had been filed against her for sharing sensitive information with Pakistan. He then threatened her with a possible 10-year imprisonment for espionage and a Rs 50 lakh fine. To legitimize his threats, he even showed her a photo of his ID card on her phone.
Fearing arrest and legal actions, the woman transferred Rs 22.4 lakh into various bank accounts provided by the scammer between June 5 and 10. After she made the payments, the phone calls stopped, and she later realized she had been deceived.
She filed a formal complaint with the Cyber Police on June 13, leading to a case being registered against unknown persons under relevant sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and the Information Technology Act.