Pune: Cybercrooks posing as officials of Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) and Mumbai police allegedly duped a 74-year-old woman from Dhayari of Rs48 lakh between Aug 26 and Aug 29.The elderly woman lodged a complaint with Nanded City police on Monday. She lives alone in her flat, while her two sons live in UK and US. They transfer her money every month. Apart from this, the woman has fixed deposit accounts and mutual funds.An officer from Nanded police said, “The suspects called her and posed as TRAI officials, claiming she had illegally purchased four new SIM cards and used them to open four bank accounts to cheat people. They claimed she was misusing her phone numbers and threatened to deactivate her SIM cards.”“The ‘TRAI official’ then told her that her SIM card services could be restored if she obtained a police clearance certificate. Within a few minutes, she received a video call from a person posing as an officer from Colaba police station in Mumbai. The officer claimed that he needed to verify the complaints against her. He then asked for details of her bank accounts, fixed deposits and other investments. The elderly woman shared all the details. The ‘officer’ then claimed her bank accounts had been used for drug trafficking,” the officer said.“After obtaining details of her bank accounts, the suspects told her they had digitally arrested her and asked her to remain in front of her mobile phone camera and send them text messages every two hours. The officer promised to settle the case against her and asked her to transfer money to four different bank accounts. The complainant subsequently broke her fixed deposits and withdrew her mutual fund investments before transferring the money to the suspects. Later, the suspects told her that she was free,” the officer said.When the complainant discussed the matter with her brother, he told her that she might have been duped.
