In the second such incident in a fortnight, a Vidyavihar resident working with the Navy lost more than Rs 68,000, after his wife got a call from a person pretending to be from a bank in which the couple has a joint account.
The accused carried out a series of transactions and a total of Rs 68,982 was withdrawn from the bank account. The complainant then the police. Last week, another Navy personnel, also a resident of Navsena Vihar at Vidyavihar, was duped in a similar manner and lost Rs 25,000.
In the latest incident, the complainant’s wife, Hemlata Suryavanshi, received a call last Monday when her husband was away. The caller told Hemlata her debit card would become non-operational by the end of the month, and to prevent that, she should give her card details, which would be updated on the system, an officer said.
Hemlata shared the card details, after which the caller told her she would receive an SMS on her mobile phone and she should tell him about the One Time Password. Hemlata shared the OTP too, and many transactions were carried out using the card.
At this, she became suspicious and rushed to her bank, where she was informed that she had fallen victim to a fraud. She was told that Rs 68,982 had been withdrawn from her account. Hemlata then informed her husband, who approached the Ghatkopar police.
An officer from Ghatkopar police station said: “There are two similar cases were Navy employees have been targeted by the fraudsters. We are checking if the cases are linked.”
The Mumbai Police helpline set up for victims of such frauds has been receiving a minimum of 20 calls every day. Most say they received fraudulent calls from people pretending to be their bank’s employees.
