IAS officer robbed of 1L by online fraudsters

Transport Department Principal Secretary B Basavaraju has become the victim of online fraud.

Approximately Rs 1 lakh was stolen from his bank account after he shared vital information regarding his bank details with a caller posing as an employee of the State Bank of India.

On Nov. 19. Basavaraju received a phone call from a person who introduced himself as Santosh Subrahmaniya and said that he was an SBI employee. The caller said that Basavaraju's debit card was about to expire.

Basavaraju then shared the card details without checking the expiry date on the card. The caller crossverified the account details with the card details and later called and asked for a One Time Password (OTP). The whole operation was done within minutes. Basavaraju later realised that he was robbed of around Rs 1 lakh.

Basavaraju lodged a complaint at the cyber crimes police station and froze his bank account. The number from which Basavaraju received the phone call was a blacklisted number.

The cyber crime police have registered an FIR under the sections 66(C) and (D) of the IT Act of the IPC for identity theft to fraudulently use passwords or electric signature and online impersonation and cheating.