Mumbai A 27-year-old woman from Malad was duped of ₹5.07 lakh by a gang of cyber frauds who befriended her on Instagram by posing as a businessman from United Kingdom.
Police officials said that the accused, under the pretext of sending her expensive gifts, gold jewellery and cash in foreign currency for her birthday, claimed to have sent a parcel to India. The parcel was intercepted at the Delhi Airport by security officials and later the complainant was made to pay various taxes, fees and penalties to get her “gift” cleared from all security checks. She transferred a total ₹5.07 lakh in various bank accounts as instructed by the frauds, who posed as various government officials.
Police officials said the Malad (east) resident informed them that on April 28, she received a request on Instagram from a person identifying himself as one James Bond from the United Kingdom. She accepted the request and the two started chatting over messenger and WhatsApp. This Bond posed as a businessman from the UK and the two soon became friends.
Later, he asked the complainant about her birthday so that he could send her some gifts. She informed him that it was May 30 and on his insistence, also shared her address.
After a few days, Bond informed her that he had sent a parcel on her address containing some gold jewellery, expensive clothes, etc.
On May 17, the woman received a call from one Ms Neha, who posed as an officer from the Reserve Bank of India division at the Delhi Airport and informed the complainant that she would have to pay tax of ₹25,500 to get the parcel cleared. The complainant transferred the money in the bank account as per Neha’s instruction, stated the FIR.
Later, the officer told her that there were US dollars in the parcel and she would have to pay a penalty of ₹26,000 to get it cleared. After she paid the ‘penalty’, the RBI officer made her pay for various other charges such as fee for getting an anti-terrorism certificate, taxes, etc. The complainant ended up paying ₹5.06 lakh to the fraudsters.
All this while, she also spoke to Bond about the taxes and fees, and he too suggested that she should pay the charges to get the parcel delivered to her, said a police officer. However, as the ‘officers’ kept on demanding more and more money, the complainant realised that she was getting scammed.
On Wednesday, she lodged a police complaint in this regard based on which the Kurar police registered an First Information Report under relevant sections of Indian Penal Code and Information Technology Act for cheating and impersonation.
The police said the modus-operandi is old and it indicates the involvement of a Nigerian gang in the fraud. The police are in process of writing to concerned banks to get the details of the beneficiary bank accounts, another officer said.