A businessman in Mumbai recently lost about two crore rupees after unknown people called him saying that drugs and other contraband were found in the FedEx Courier he was planning to send out of India. The scammers posed as sleuths of crime police, cyber police officials, and customs officials. As things turned out we found a massive scam which has victims losing millions of rupees across the length and breadth of India.
It all starts with a normal phone call wherein victim is told that the courier he/she is planning to send outside of India has contraband in it and is not getting cleared by customs. Moreover, he then received a subsequent call from cyber officials and crime branch officials telling him that a contraband found in a courier meant for export can carry a life sentence. The person is told to either things online or to visit the nearby police station and get himself arrested.
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Once the victim opts for clearing things online then he is sent a link online to make payment. It is amazing to note that these scammers get hold of a database wherein details of FedEx courier service users is made available to them. Second they further shortlist it to ones who use FedEx to send couriers to countries where anti-contraband laws are the toughest. Then scammers get a landline number marked as something like ‘contraband unit of Mumbai customs police’ on apps like Truecaller so that when a person receives the call he is hundred percent sure that it is from a custom police only.
This online fraud looks watertight on the face of it and initially the perpetrators got away with a bit of a beginners luck. But as the number of victims increased their modus operandi became known. However, still hundreds of people are getting duped day in and day out.
Enough messaging needs to be broadcast by the government drawing people’s attention towards these scammers. Also the ones caught should be given exemplary punishment so that other scammers get alarmed and desist from indulging in this.
We in Kashmir are lucky to have a great Cyber crimes unit. The Cyber Crimes unit of valley has been able to retrieve money of people stolen online on multiple occasions. We need to be on our guard all the time.
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