Hyderabad: Two city residents have lost ₹1.58 crore in separate online stock investment frauds executed through Telegram groups and fake trading platforms. On the complaint of the victims, Hyderabad Cyber Crime police registered two FIRs on Thursday.In the first case, a 36-year-old businessman from Sultan Shahi told police that he was added to a Telegram group in May 2026 when he clicked on a WhatsApp message link advertising a stock investment scheme. A fraudster, Arvind, posing as a stock investment adviser, promised the victim 15-20% returns. Believing the scheme to be promising, the victim had transferred ₹15 lakh on May 16 to a bank account provided by the accused. Subsequently, in the next few weeks, he invested a total of ₹86.5 lakh through the same method. When he tried to withdraw, the accused demanded an additional payment of ₹16.5 lakh to release his money. The victim approached police on Thursday. A case was registered under Sections 66C and 66D of the IT Act and Sections 318(4) and 319(2) of the BNS.In the second incident, a 56-year-old woman from Saidabad alleged that she was lured through a Facebook advertisement featuring the fake video of Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman promoting a stock trading platform. When she clicked on the link in the advertisement, the victim was directly added to a Telegram group operated by the fraudsters, Srinivas and Balaji. She was also made to register on a fake trading app installed through a link shared by the accused. As the accused had allowed her to withdraw about ₹1,000 initially, she had transferred over ₹71.8 lakh to various bank accounts between May and July. “The fake app showed virtual profits of ₹9.85 crore but I was not allowed to withdraw it,” the victim told police on Thursday.Based on their complaints, two separate cases were registered under relevant sections of the BNS and the IT Act on Thursday by Hyderabad Cyber Crime police.
