Mumbai: A 43-year-old healthcare executive from Mumbai has lost ₹7.20 lakh to frauds who blackmailed him by posing as Delhi cyber police officials. The executive, a resident of Chinchpokli, had on July 13 received a Facebook friend request from a woman named Ankita Sharma. He accepted the request and the two of them began chatting.
The woman later made a video call to the complainant and began undressing. The man told the police that he disconnected the call and blocked her on Facebook. Sharma then placed a video call on his WhatsApp number and asked him to undress as she began taking off her clothes again. The man said he then blocked her number.
On July 14, the complainant received a call and the caller threatened to upload the video that Sharma had recorded on YouTube and Facebook, and demanded ₹15,000. The executive transferred the amount and switched off his WhatsApp number.
Subsequently, on July 18, a man named Arun Saxena called him and introduced himself as a cybercrime officer from Delhi. He told the complainant that the obscene video had been uploaded on YouTube and other social media sites. When the victim narrated the entire episode, Saxena gave him a number and asked him to contact the man to pull down the videos from YouTube. Still, the man at the other end demanded ₹76,000 as processing charges for deleting the video from all social media platforms.
On Monday after the complainant paid the amount, Saxena called and informed him that Sharma had committed suicide and had given his name among others responsible for her action. Saxena even forwarded a photo where Sharma was seen lying on the bed as if she was dead and informed him Sharma’s relatives were demanding ₹5 lakh to settle the case and remove his name from the FIR registered against him for abetment to suicide.
“I was scared and agreed to pay them,” said the complainant. But, after sending the amount, Saxena called him again and demanded more money, the complainant realised that he was being duped and approached the Nirmal Nagar police.
“We have registered a complaint and are trying to trace the three numbers of the sextortion racketeers and the fake cyber police officer,” said a police officer.