Kothrud company loses Rs 24 lakh to phishing scam

PUNE: A city-based company fell prey to a phishing scam, in which its officials — believing they were corresponding with a German company over e-mail — transferred Rs24 lakh in December.

Once the fraud was discovered, a company official lodged a complaint with the Alankar police, who have booked an unknown number of fraudsters, whose identity is yet to be determined.

According to police, the firm, which has its office in Dahanukar Colony, Kothrud, has been doing regular business with the German company for the past few years — it purchases machinery from the German firm and sells them its products.

On December 18, the Kothrud firm received an e-mail from an address that closely resembled the German company’s e-mail ID. In that e-mail, which claimed to be from the German company’s director, the company said it wanted to purchase some tools and equipment from India and promised the Pune company a good commission on this deal.

Further, the email tod the Pune-based company to transfer Rs24 lakh to another company, from which the tools and equipment were to be procured. The Pune company did as asked. However, when the company’s officials contacted their German counterparts after transferring the money, they were in for a rude shock — the German company denied either sending the email or placing the order.

A preliminary inquiry revealed that the fake e-mail address looked similar to the official e-mail address, but certain numerical and alphabetical values were changed to fool the recipients.

An officer from the cybercrime cell of the Pune police said the police had registered eight such high-value cases in 2018, in which either individuals or companies have been duped.