A retired government officer from Navi Mumbai has become the latest victim of the Facebook ad scam. The 70-year-old man, who was randomly scrolling through his feed, came across a fake stock investment page. Tempted by the profiles and high gains, he filled in the details and slowly invested over Rs 5 crore to the fake application. Here’s exactly what happened:
According to reports, the retired officer saw a Facebook advertisement promoting stock investments. He contacted the page by providing his personal information, and in response, fraudsters contacted him via WhatsApp and asked him to join a ‘A24KKR Collaborative Win’ app link to become a member for trading, as confirmed by the police officer.
After logging in to the applications, he gradually invested some amount via the application. Soon after that, the fraudsters lured him to download a new ‘INDKKR’ app to see all the profits he had made through his investment. Everything seemed perfect till he made his first withdrawal of Rs 5,000 and Rs 2,000. This gave him a green signal to invest more in the application.
Till March 8, he invested over Rs 4.7 crore through his wife’s demat account. Interestingly, he was able to see a profit of Rs 12.2 crore. However, the scam unfolded when tried to withdraw the profit. He found out that his account was frozen and he was unable to do any activity. After some time, he found out that he was getting scammed and registered his complaint to the nearest authorities.
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“We have initiated a probe and sought details of the bank accounts where the complainant was made to transfer money. As victims approach the police after months, detection of such crimes becomes time-consuming,” the report quoted Gajanan Kadam, senior inspector, as saying.
Here are a few key tips that you should follow in order to stay safe from such scams.