Cyber Fraud: 40-year-old man loses over Rs 46 lakh through Instagram post

The police have begun an investigation and are trying to locate the culprits.

Date: July 13, 2024

Mumbai Cyber Police has received yet another complaint of online fraud that took place through an Instagram post.

A 40-year-old Goregaon man, who works as a manager for a tech company, fell prey to a share trading cyber fraud and lost Rs 46.4 lakh.

On April 6, he clicked on an Instagram post and was automatically added to a WhatsApp group named ‘5 Paisa J03 Value Investment Portfolio’, that had over 171 members. On the group, information regarding various stocks was being shared on the platform, encouraging people to trade.

Soon after receiving the complaint, the police began an investigation and are trying to locate the culprits obtaining details of the transactions and the end beneficiaries, from the bank.

According to the police, one of the admins of the WhatsApp group on May 9, on personal chat, encouraged the complainant to earn a good profit via their mobile application, ‘FIVE PAISA SES’.

The FIR stated that following their instructions, the complainant signed up on the app, and opened an account. After this, the admins and his associates would guide him in trading. They would ask him to deposit money in their system for trading and earning money.

The complainant would follow the same and would see profit crediting in his account opened with their trading app.

For the next month, he did ‘trading’ following their instructions and could see a total of Rs 1.62 crore credited in his virtual wallet.

However, when the complainant tried to withdraw the same, his request was declined.

Therefore, he contacted the system admin and their associates, they told him that his account had been blocked due to some rules violations, and once he paid the Rs 44.64 lakh penalty only he would get all the money. After this, the complainant realised that he was being duped.

The three accused persons regularly called him and threatened him to pay the money or else he would have to face action from SEBI for the ‘crime’, said an officer.

Later, he finally approached the North Region Cyber Police and filed a complaint.

The police have registered a case under relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code and Information Technology Act for cheating, impersonation, forgery, criminal conspiracy, etc. against three suspects and are probing the matter.