Cyber Crime
Nigerians and Women Arrested in Gurugram for Duping Hundreds Of Women via Social Media
GURUGRAM: The Gurugram Police have arrested six people, including four Nigerians and two women, for allegedly duping hundreds of women by befriending them via social media. According to the police, the gang used to befriend young women through social media platforms and extract money from them with the help of the arrested women.
The police received a complaint on March 13 from a woman who claimed to have befriended a man through social media. The man, who introduced himself as a doctor based in the United Kingdom, started talking to her over the phone. On April 4, the woman received a call from a woman who claimed to be a customs official. The official informed the victim that gold and foreign currency had arrived in her name, for which she had to pay Rs 45,000 as tax, which she did. Thereafter, she transferred another Rs 8.85 lakh as tax to the suspects.
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Following this, the woman reported the matter to the police, and a case was registered in the cybercrime police station A (east), Gurugram. During the probe, the police arrested six accused from Delhi’s Mohan Garden. The arrested accused include Samuel Ubaka Igwatu, Emmanuel Chukwudi, Anidebe Emeka Alex, Audimnobifitu Aloysis, a Nigerian national, and Wassomichon and Chanchamaliyu Panme, a Manipur resident.
Investigations revealed that the Nigerian national was illegally staying in India, and their passport/visa had already expired. The police recovered 16 mobile phones, 18 SIM cards, four laptops, six debit cards, as many pen drives, three passports, and Rs 31,000 from their possession.
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Speaking about the arrest, Priyanshu Diwan, ACP (cybercrime), said, “The accused used to befriend young women via social media and, along with the arrested women, extract money from the victims.”
How The Scam Operates:
The fraudsters involved in the Gurugram scam created fake profiles on social media to target women. They would initiate contact with women and build trust over time by chatting with them and sending messages frequently. Once they had gained the victim’s confidence, they would start making false promises.
In this particular scam, the fraudsters promised to send an expensive gift to the victim. They claimed that the gift had been held at customs and that the victim needed to pay a tax in order to get the gift released. The victim was asked to transfer the tax amount to a specified bank account. The fraudsters would even use fake profiles of customs officials or lawyers to convince the victim that the tax was legitimate.
Once the victim transferred the tax amount, the fraudsters would ask for more money, citing various reasons such as additional taxes, courier charges, and so on. The victims, having already trusted the fraudsters, would end up transferring large sums of money in the hopes of receiving the promised gift.
In reality, there was no gift, and the fraudsters were simply exploiting the victims’ trust to extort money from them. The scam was uncovered when one of the victims reported the matter to the police, leading to the arrest of the six accused involved in the scam.
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The police have urged the public to remain vigilant while using social media platforms and to report any suspicious activity to the authorities immediately. The accused have been booked under various sections of the Indian Penal Code and the Information Technology Act. The police are also investigating the possibility of the involvement of other members of the gang in the crime.
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