A 56-year-old engineer in Bengaluru was allegedly defrauded of Rs 2.44 crore after he installed an unsecured mobile application to invest in US stocks.
Suresh (name changed at his request), who filed a complaint at the South CEN police station on Tuesday, said he received a WhatsApp message on July 1 from a US number claiming to offer lucrative stock trading opportunities. He was invited to join a WhatsApp group named Chandra High-Quality Bull Plan Screening Group-XY36, where the group admin posted about US stock trading and promised substantial profits.
On July 2, Suresh paid a membership fee of Rs 999 to join a Telegram group, where a person named Jeevan Gopal assisted him with trading. On July 25, he was instructed to open a demat account through an app installed via an apk file and he subsequently invested Rs 2.44 crore in multiple transactions.
However, when Suresh attempted to withdraw his funds, he was informed that he needed to pay 30 per cent of his profits. He transferred Rs 50,000 but found his account deactivated thereafter, prompting him to report the incident to the police.
The police have registered a case under sections 66D (cheating by personation) and 66C (identity theft) of the Information Technology Act as well as sections 318(4) (deceiving any person) and 319(2) (cheating by personation) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.
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