Instagram ad, Rs 10,000 seed fund used as baits to cheat Pune woman of Rs 3 crore in online share trading fraud

In January this year, the complainant came across an advertisement on Instagram which promised multifold returns. After clicking the link, she was added to a WhatsApp group. A large number of members of the group were discussing how their ‘institutional accounts’ helped them earn huge profits on investments in equity. After reading the messages for close to two months, the complainant was offered a ‘seed amount’ of Rs 10,000 for investment, which was directly transferred to her account. She was then made to download and log on to a phone-based application, which the probe has now revealed was fraudulent.

Over the coming one month, the cyber criminals kept telling her about new investment opportunities in the stock market and the complainant continued making large transfers. All this while, the phone-based app kept showing over six times her ‘investments’ as profits. In between, she was allowed to make small withdrawals totalling around Rs 1 lakh. After 30 large transfers to 12 bank accounts totalling Rs 3.04 crore, her account on the app reflected profits of Rs 20.66 crore. When she expressed willingness to withdraw all the money, she was told that before withdrawing the money she would have to pay 30 per cent of the total profits as charity and 10 per cent as fees. It was at this point that she realised she was being cheated. She subsequently approached the Cyber crime police station and an FIR was registered.

In another case registered two weeks ago, a Pune-based CA was cheated of a staggering Rs 3.4 crore in an elaborate share trading by cyber frauds, of which over Rs 2 crore was taken by him as loans from various banks. The cyber criminals used a WhatsApp group named after a British financial major to lure him with high returns on ‘block trade’ and ‘upper circuit trading’.

Over the last five months, the Pune and Pimpri Chinchwad police have reported what their cyber investigators are calling an epidemic, a worrying surge in online share trading fraud cases. Fraudsters employ a variety of baits, including trading tips, virtual lectures, mobile applications, and enticing promises of exorbitant returns. SEBI’s advisory on February 26 underscored these tactics, cautioning against fraudsters posing as SEBI-registered entities and exploiting social media platforms to peddle fraudulent trading schemes.