72-Year-Old Retired Engineer Duped Of ₹10 Crore In Digital Arrest Scam

Over ₹10 crore has been siphoned off from a 72-year-old retired engineer from Delhi in a shocking cybercrime case. The victim was kept on “digital arrest” for eight hours at his home in Rohini, while the Delhi Cyber Cell along with the unit of Intelligence Fusion and Strategic Operations, IFSO, is investigating the case while trying to recover the siphoned amount.

The ordeal began when the victim, who resides in Rohini’s Sector 10 with his wife, received a call about a parcel allegedly intercepted at Mumbai airport. The caller claimed the parcel, addressed in the victim’s name, contained banned drugs and that the Mumbai Police Crime Branch would contact him regarding the matter.

The fraudsters told the retired engineer to download Skype, and further communication happened through that platform. On a video call of eight hours’ duration, the victim was kept in the state of “digital arrest” and was forced to remit ₹10.3 crore into multiple bank accounts by citing the reason of escaping some legal hassles.

Family And Police Intervention

The victim finally told his family about the whole incident, which led them to go to the police at the beginning of October. An FIR was filed with the Delhi Police Cyber Cell, and the IFSO wing took over the investigation. The police managed to freeze ₹60 lakh of the stolen money, though much of it had already been distributed across multiple bank accounts.

It is suspected that the scam was orchestrated by callers based abroad, with local associates providing information about the victim,” said a police officer involved in the case. A team of cyber experts and police officials are working to trace the perpetrators and recover the stolen amount.

Threats To Family Members

Adding to the distress of the victim, as claimed by the scammers, threats were also made to harm his two children – a son who stays in Dubai and a daughter in Singapore – if he did not comply with their demands. It is this psychological pressure on the victim that has been very significant in extracting such a huge amount of money.

This is another cybercrime case in India, especially in regards to old age scams. The police have warned citizens, appealing not to get terrorized when called by strangers asking for money or threaten them with sending to jail.

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