The Cyber Crime Wing of the Central Crime Branch has launched an investigation into a series of complaints on creation of fake profiles of Facebook users and collecting money from people on the friends list of original profiles. The police suspect that a Rajasthan-based gang is involved in the crime.
Last year, taking advantage of the lockdown, the cyber fraudsters created fake Facebook accounts of then Commissioner of Police Mahesh Kumar Aggarwal and more than two dozen IPS officers in the city. They did not spare police officers of Telangana, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh either. The cyber crime police of those States together launched an investigation after taking up a bunch of complaints.
A gang of cyber criminals operating in Bharatpur district in Rajasthan was nabbed last November.
The police suspect that similar gangs could be operating again with many Facebook users finding their fake profiles being created. The police have appealed to the people not to fall prey to the fraudsters.
Modus operandi
A senior police officer said, “We have received over 100 complaints now. Earlier, they were targeting the profiles of police officers. Now they target common people. They copy the profile pictures of a person from his/her Facebook account and use them to create fake profiles which appear deceptively similar. They then befriend people from the user’s friends list, asking for money on grounds of medical emergencies, including COVID-19,” said the officer.
“They target the victims at odd hours through messenger app. They send only text messages and do not take calls,” said another officer explaining the modus operandi of the cyber fraudsters.
