With the increase in digitization of the transactions, there has also been an increase in cyber crimes. Recently, actress Shweta Menon, along with 40 other people fell prey to a bank account fraud and were duped of several lakhs within just three days. According to a report by Free Press Journal, it happened after the actress clicked a spam link which she had received on her phone, through a text message.
It is being reported that nearly all the people, who were duped of their hard earned money including Shweta, belonged to a single private bank. The television personality lost ₹57,600 from her two accounts after which she flagged the issue with her bank and decided to file a complaint in Khar.
Shedding light on the matter, FPJ quoted Shweta, who won the Femina Miss India Asia Pacific 1994, as, “Luckily, the sum that I lost did not run into lakhs of rupees. The scamster stole my banking details after I clicked the link and entered two OTPs, a Pan card number, a net banking ID and a password.” She added that soon enough two fraud fund transactions were carried out.
“As I clicked the link, I received a call from a person claiming to be a bank telecaller and instructing me to enter the OTP. He tried to keep me engaged in the call. But I smelled something wrong when I received two transaction alerts. I immediately disconnected the call,” she continued.
With the rise of such cases, Mumbai cyber police has issued a warning to the users to stay alert and not fall prey to such messages. The publication reports that one of the most common forms of online frauds are related to banks. Fraudsters use online commercial platforms posing as banks to convince their victims to share OTPs, KYC updates with them. They also send links so that they can get access to the back accounts of their victims.
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