The Cyber Crime Wing of Tamil Nadu Police has warned people about new threats.
Recently, a complaint was received by the wing about a financial fraud through WhatsApp, Telegram, Instagram, Facebook or YouTube either by sending SMS or by advertisements.
Initially, they promise good returns for just putting “likes” to some YouTube videos, hotels, websites. Later, they introduce some prepaid missions/tasks. Then, the victims will be added in some Telegram group comprising several participants.
The fraudsters introduce themselves as social influencers. Everyone will be instructed to soon attend some tasks by investing money in bitcoin / cryptocurrency, said ADGP, Cyber Crime Wing, Sanjay Kumar.
”Then the fraudsters will ask victims to login to a web portal referred by them and create a login ID and password. Some tutor or mentor will be provided by them to guide in making the investment. Ahead of the prepaid mission, one has to login with his password and send money to some individual bank accounts,” he said.
To make people believe, the result of investment would appear on the portal page as “Assets” reflecting the profits one earned along with the amount invested. Initially, for small investment, profits would be credited to the victims’ bank account.
Then, the person would be introduced to some other prepaid missions where the number of tasks and the amount to be invested would be higher. At this point of time, only assets could be viewed in the page.
If the investors complained about not being able to withdraw money, the fraudsters would give lame excuses such as low credit score, or the wrong options the investors had chosen. Or they would say the withdrawal of lumpsum amount required generation of ticket, deposit of 30% of the assets value and so on.
Mr. Kumar advises people not to reply to any unknown persons in WhatsApp, Telegram, Instagram, etc. “People should not get greedy with attractive advertisements.
Also do not click any links or share OTP with anyone over phone call or message. Despite awareness created over the years, many people continue to be cheated by fraudsters,” he said.
Reporting of cyber crimes within 24 hours by dialling helpline number 1930 would help in retrieving the money back, the police said.
