(Representational Photo)
KOCHI: What if you are an accountant and a fraudster posing as your boss sends you a message asking to transfer money from the company accounts for emergency reasons? Something similar happened at Aluva-based herbal extract manufacturing and exporting company which lost more than Rs 44 lakhs following a cyber fraud a few weeks ago.
Ernakulam Rural Police has registered a case and started a probe into the incident that took place on January 19 this year. On that day around 12.43 pm, the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of the company received a WhatsApp message from an account with the profile picture of the company’s Managing Director (MD). The MD was on a tour abroad and not reachable on phone. In the message, the CFO was directed to transfer money to five bank accounts. The message also conveyed that it was for some emergency purpose.
Believing it to be a genuine message, the CFO made four RTGS transactions to the tune of Rs 44,47,905 to four HDFC bank accounts from the company’s accounts with Standard Chartered Bank and City Bank between 12.30pm and 3.15pm. Though one more transaction was made, it was not cleared. However, the cheating was realised when MD came to know about the transactions. The same day CFO approached the police and a case was registered under various sections of the IPC and Information Technology Act.
M B Latheef, Station House Officer, Ernakulam Rural Cyber Police Station said an investigation is on and attempts are being made to trace the bank accounts to which the amount was transferred. “Soon after transactions were completed, the fund was transferred by fraudsters to other bank accounts. We are attempting to trace these accounts and the money transferred from them. In most cases, we have found that criminals use accounts in new-generation banks. The reason for such a practice has to be probed,” he said.
It remains a puzzle before the police about how the fraudster received information about the MD and CFO of the company. Similarly, how the criminals came to know that MD is on a tour. “We asked the company officials to check whether their emails or website were hacked or they suspect malware in their computers. But they have ruled out any such hack. There are chances that the fraudster might have been following the MD and CFO on social media,” he said.
Kerala is witnessing a rampant rise in cyber cases over the years. As many as 815 cases were registered in 2022 compared to 626 in 2021 and 426 in 2020, according to the Kerala Police website.
