Ahmedabad: A 36-year-old man from Saraspur was allegedly duped of over Rs 4.54 lakh after fraudsters posed as representatives of a finance company and tricked him into downloading a malicious mobile application, stated an FIR lodged with Shaherkotda police.According to the FIR, the complainant, who works at a gems firm in the Bapunagar area and lives with his wife and two minor children, received a call on Jan 18 from a person claiming to be from a finance company. The caller told him to apply for an online loan. “As we were in need of money, I agreed, following which the loan amount was credited to my bank account through an agent,” the complainant stated in the FIR.The complainant further told police that the caller later assured him that his monthly instalment could be reduced. “He said I would receive another call from the finance company regarding the reduction in EMI,” the FIR noted.Later that afternoon, the complainant received another call from an unknown person who again claimed to be from the same finance company. The caller offered to reduce the instalment amount and asked the complainant to download an APK file sent on WhatsApp. “Believing his words, I downloaded the application. Soon, my mobile phone stopped functioning and a message appeared on the screen stating that the EMI file was being processed,” the FIR said.Suspicion arose when the process took unusually long. The complainant’s wife briefly removed the sim card, after which the caller allegedly warned that the process would have to be restarted and the company would not be responsible if money was deducted. “After reinserting the sim card, the same processing message appeared again, which made us more suspicious,” the FIR stated. The complainant and his wife then went to a nearby ATM to check their account balance. “To our shock, the entire amount of Rs 4.54 lakh was withdrawn from my account through online transactions,” he told police.He approached the cybercrime helpline and later lodged a formal complaint with police.Police said the accused allegedly hacked the complainant’s phone using the fake application and siphoned off the money. An investigation was initiated to identify the caller and others involved in the fraud.
