A man from Maharashtra’s Thane city was duped of nearly Rs 5 lakh in cyber fraud after he relied on the results of a Google search to seek refunds for his cancelled trip to an African nation, an official said on Wednesday.

The man in his police complaint, said that he had booked return tickets to the Kenya capital Nairobi as he and his friend wanted to visit the city of Mombasa. The tickets were booked for April 29 and May 05 and he paid Rs 1.46 lakh for them.

However, his plans changed and he decided to cancel the tickets and seek refunds, said the official. He filled out a form for a refund on the website of the airline on April 11.

When the complainant could not get through to the airline’s helpline, he ran a Google search and got what he thought to be the contact number of the airline, said the official.

He dialled the number and was told that the airline’s technical team would get in touch with him and facilitate the refund, the official said.

A man then spoke to the complainant and said he was eligible for a refund of Rs 1.28 lakh. He asked the complainant to download an app, got complete access to his phone and stole Rs 4.8 lakh from his accounts, said the official.

On the basis of the man’s complaint, the Chitalsar police on Tuesday registered a case under the IT Act. A probe is on, said the official, adding that no arrest has been made yet.

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