Victims aged between 18 & 35 most vulnerable to online frauds

Lavkesh approached the cyber cell. The initial probe revealed that Lavkesh had borrowed Rs 4,000 through an instant loan providing online firm and failed to repay the amount. The online firm, which had the right to access the contacts of Lavkesh, had sent these messages.

Gurleen Kaur (22) of Mani Majra, was befriended on Instagram by one Edwina Gomes of Canada. Edwina promised Gurleen two-side air tickets at 25 per cent discount through her friend, Abhishek, in Delhi. Gurleen took Abhishek’s number from Edwina and passed it to her father, who deposited Rs 69,097 in Abhishek’s bank account, only to realise that they were cheated by fraudsters. Later, the cyber cell arrested Shrikrishna Virender Kumar Gautam, who confessed to cheating Gurleen and others befriending them on Facebook, Instagram and other online platforms. He was arrested on February 15.

Besides Lavkesh and Gurleen, there are hundreds of young people in the age group of 18 to 35 years who have become victims of online immigration frauds, job frauds, stalking, bullying allurements of costly gifts and friendships with foreign nationals.

A source in the UT cyber cell said, “Besides procuring small amounts through instant loan providing online platforms, a new trend is being witnessed for the last few months in Chandigarh. This trend pertains to earning easy money while investing in the crypto currency. Titcoin, Shibonk, Dogscoin are the famous crypto currencies, which have low prices, among the college-going students. Some complaints were received but the number of complaints is low. We are expecting the number will increase in the future.”

There are many instant loan providing online platforms, which deduct the interest on the principal amount well in advance out of the money transferred in the account of the applicant. One has to download the mobile application of the firm, which keeps the right to access all the contacts of the applicant.

As per the available records, 319 complaints of abusive calls, messages through WhatsApp, Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) calls, 108 complaints of cheating through fake Facebook accounts, Instagram, 33 complaints of work visa, job permits in foreign countries, nine complaints for providing jobs through naukri.com are among a total of 1,286 complaints received in the last three months in the UT cyber cell. Victims in these complaints belong to the age group of 18 years to 35 years.

“People of this age group (18 year to 35 year) are vulnerable to many online crimes. Many of them innocently fall in the trap of online fraudsters, who target them knowing many things about them through their profiles on the social networking sites. Young people are anxious about jobs after completing their graduation and many of them fall victim to online job providing firms. In some of the cases, mature people lost lakhs of rupees to the fraudsters, who trapped them through fictitious foreign national identities promising them the delivery of costly gifts from their sides. Victims here used to deposit the money presuming that they are paying the custom duties,” said DSP (cyber) Rashmi Yadav Sharma.

Dos and don’ts
Gurcharan Singh, cyber faculty head at Central Detective Training School, Sector 36, lists a few dos and don’ts here:
– Do not trust people blindly on social media sites, including Facebook and Instagram.
–  Always lock your profile on social media sites disallowing access to people on your friend list.
– Repeated awareness camps about cyber crimes should be organised at schools, colleges and universities.
– Always visit physically the visa providing firms, placement providing firms.
– People should trust the websites starting with ‘https’, which are the most secure sites.