In a new case of SIM card swapping fraud, scammers reportedly duped a Pune-based chartered accountant of Rs 2.2 lakh from her bank account. The phishing fraud is said to have happened on May 28, when the victim, whose name was not revealed in the report, received a call from scammers that pretended to be engaged with her telecom operator. During the conversation, they seemingly convinced her that she was still using a 3G SIM card, which required urgent upgrade to 4G or risked being blocked immediately.
A report by ET Telecom states that after receiving the call, the 39-year-old was duped into believing that the callers were legitimate. The scammers made the victim reveal certain key details about her phone number, following which they reportedly sent a 20-digit code to her phone number and asked her to click on it. Soon after this, the victim’s original SIM card was automatically deactivated, and the scammers took control of her number on a cloned SIM card that they now possessed, with her number registered on it. They then used it to siphon off funds worth Rs 2.2 lakh from her account.
The report reveals that the victim then received alerts of transactions being made from her bank account, following which she alerted her bank and blocked access to her account – but not before facing a significant loss already. An FIR on the matter was then lodged with the police department at Pune’s Alankar Police Station. According to the report, the police are still investigating the case of fraud, and the clear suspicion behind this scam is one of SIM card swapping fraud.
SIM swapping frauds are among the most common form of phishing frauds that occur on a regular basis. To stay safe from such incidents, users are requested to not share any sensitive details over phone, unless they specifically opt for phone banking services via authorised contact hotlines of banks. It is always advised that users remain constantly vigilant about sharing any form of technical details about their particulars, and any SIM upgrade activities should only be performed by a user in person by visiting the stores of their telecom operators.
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