Hyderabad: The Hyderabad cybercrime police on Tuesday arrested a 27-year-old data entry operator Shiva Shankar from Noida in Uttar Pradesh for his alleged involvement in investment and trading fraud. The accused was involved in three cases in the country including one in Telangana.
A 35-year-old private employee from Hyderabad received a WhatsApp message offering online stock investment ideas for the stock market. The fraudster provided a link to join their WhatsApp group, where they claimed to offer institutional stocks, OTC stocks and other group stocks promising high profits in a short time, the police said.
Believing the promises to be genuine, the victim proceeded to transfer a significant amount of money from his bank accounts. The scammers claimed that his investments were in bulk stocks and IPOs, which would yield a huge profit of 20 per cent on his invested capital.
On their application, he could see apparent profits. However, when he decided to withdraw his profits, they informed him that the amount was still tied up in the so-called IPOs. When he insisted on withdrawing his earnings, they demanded that he deposit an additional amount.
At this point, he realized it was a scam and demanded a refund. He attempted to contact them via phone and messages, but they did not respond. Eventually, they blocked his access to chats and calls. In total, the victim lost Rs.14.63 lakh
The police said the fraudsters were contacting victims through social media platforms offering double or triple the profits in a short time in stock market trading. Initially, they show huge returns in their application and allow withdrawal to certain extent and encourage investment proposals with huge profits and later dupe investors.
Two mobile phones, four cheque books and two debit cards were seized from the possession of the arrested person