Two men, including a former employee of a popular digital wallet company, were arrested Sunday in Chennai for allegedly swindling money by sticking QR codes in front of small shops alongside Old Mahabalipuram Road. The former employee, Vallarasu (21), and his friend Robert (32) were arrested during a routine vehicle check and were produced before the magistrate by the city police. Their mobile phones have been confiscated and police are investigating how much money the duo has cheated. Vallarasu, who hailed from Kallukattai area near Perungudi, was associated with a digital wallet company and was in charge of convincing shopkeepers alongside the busy IT corridor to use QR code stickers for transactions. According to a report in DT Next, to achieve targets, Vallarasu had used phone numbers of his friends and other relatives and had linked them to his friend Srinivasan’s bank account. Earlier in March, Vallarasu had quit his job and did not handover the unused QR codes to the company. Since he already knew which shops had been using QR codes in Thoraippakam and Kandanchavadi, he pasted the unused stickers and swindled money. According to local reports, a tea shop owner, Durai, complained that he hasn’t been receiving the amount transferred by his customers through the QR code sticker stuck in front of his shop for the past couple of days. He had crosschecked with the bank where he was confirmed that no transaction has been done to his account. He then lodged a complaint with the Thoraippakam police station and after analysing CCTV footage, they found two men pasting the sticker over the existing ones in the late-night hours.
