Fraud Alert! ‘Buy one thali, get one free’ offer can be a trap. Read here
Cyber frauds: The victim visited the site on November 27, 2022, and made a call on the given number to make an inquiry about the deal. However, she did not get any response but received a callback.
PremiumA 40-year-old woman from southwest Delhi allegedly lost ₹90,000 after downloading an application for getting a ‘buy one thali (food thali), get another free’ offer. The victim has been identified as Savita Sharma, who works as a senior executive at a bank.
She registered a complaint at the cyber police station and stated that one of her relatives informed her about the offer on Facebook, according to a report published by the news agency PTI.
She visited the site on November 27, 2022, and made a call on the given number to make an inquiry about the deal. However, she did not get any response but received a callback.
“The caller asked her to get the offer of Sagar Ratna (a popular restaurant chain)," Sharma said in her FIR lodged on May 2 this year.
Speaking to PTI, the victim said, “The caller shared a link and asked me to download an application to avail of the offer. He also sent the user ID and password to access the app. He told me that if I want to get the offer, I will have to register on this app first."
“I clicked on the link and the app was downloaded. Then I entered the user ID and password. The moment I did it, I lost control of my phone. It was hacked and then I received a message that ₹40,000 was debited from my account," she added.
A few seconds later, she received another message that ₹50,000 was withdrawn from her account, she informed.
“It was very surprising for me that the money went from my credit card to my Paytm account and then moved out to the fraudster’s account. I never shared any of these details with the caller. I immediately blocked her credit card," Savita Sharma.
Though the cyber police are probing the matter, similar cases of fraud have been reported from other cities where people lost thousands of rupees.
When contacted, a representative of Sagar Ratna admitted that they received many such complaints from customers.
(With PTI inputs)
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