Woman from Thane district put under "digital arrest", loses Rs 2.45 crore

Thane: A 37-year-old woman from Maharashtra’s Thane district was allegedly put under digital arrest by cyber fraudsters, who posed as policemen and duped her of Rs 2.45 crore, police said on Friday.

Based on a complaint lodged by the woman, a resident of Ambernath, the police on Thursday registered a case under relevant provisions of the Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita (BNS), an official said.

On September 14, the complainant allegedly received a call from an unidentified man posing as the staffer of a courier agency, claiming a parcel she sent to Iran was rejected.

The caller said the parcel contained two expired passports, three credit cards, 5 kgs of medicines, and 450 gm of mephedrone, and the courier company had informed the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), police said.

The call was then transferred to the crime branch, where another fraudster posing as an official asked the complainant to download Skype. During the Skype call, the accused, who claimed to be a deputy commissioner of police (DCP), showed the victim a police complaint, police ID, a letter purported to be from the RBI and other documents, the official said.

The fraudster then took bank details of the woman and her mother and siphoned off Rs 2.45 crore from their accounts, he said.

A case has been registered against six persons, of which three were identified by names and the others by Skype IDs, the official said.