Woman orders Maharaja Bhog Thali online, gets duped of Rs 8.5 lac

‘Buy one and get one free’ is one of the most popular promotional offers that we get on all the commodities and when there is an offer on food, no one would want to miss it. Well, this is what a Mumbai-based woman thought while clicking on a Facebook ad that she clicked for getting the Maharaja Bhog Thali. Little did she know that this was a fraudulent ad, which later duped her of all her savings. Here’s all you need to know about this whole incident. (Images courtesy: iSTock)

Apparently, this woman (aged 54 years old) lives with her brother in Mumbai and was trying to buy Maharaja Bhog Thali, which normally costs above INR 500 in INR 200 and that too with the offer Buy 1 Get 1 Free. This offer looked so lucrative as the lady would have bought 2 Thalis for INR 200.

She didn’t realise that during this whole process she had lost INR 8.46 lakh from her bank account, which included her bank savings and some shares. The woman realized about this whole fiasco when she read all the transaction messages she received on her phone and filed an FIR with the Mumbai Police. On the day, this whole incident took place the fraudster took out the money on 27 transactions. While about 24 transactions happened yesterday.

The lady who lost more than INR 8 lakhs in this ‘online fraud’ clicked on this Facebook ad around 5 in the evening on October 19. She filled in her bank details and mobile number as a normal online transaction would ask. After this, she received a call that was followed by another link in which she entered her bank details along with her debit card number. It was then followed by an app download, named Zoho Assist that the fraudster used for remote accessing her mobile phone, which was used to read the one-time passwords (OTP) for bank transactions.

The Mumbai Police have registered a complaint under sections 419 and 420 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) for impersonation and cheating. Along with these, the Police have also registered a complaint under sections 66 C and 66 D of the Information Technology (IT) Act for identity theft and cheating using computer resources.