Person loses Rs 8,000 to online fraud

Chandigarh, March 18
A city resident was defrauded of Rs 8,200 by online fraudsters who assured her a job in a multinational company. The case of online job scam surfaced after the UT police realiSed that the accused had similarly cheated more than 40 other persons in various parts of the country. The Cyber Cell of the UT police has registered a case under various Sections of the IT Act in the Sector 11 police station. The police is yet to find out the identity of the accused.
A Sector 15 resident and an advocate by profession, Prerna, was promised a job in Wipro Technologies for the post of executive manager. She received an email asking her to deposit an amount of Rs 8,250 as fees for security, air travel and other expenses. She was told that the amount was refundable. She deposited the amount in a bank account of Raj Kumar in the PNB bank.
After that there was no response from the company and Prerna realised that she had been duped. She then reported the matter to the police.
The police said the mail to the victim was sent from wipro@tech-centre.com and as per the instructions in the mail, the girl had deposited the money in the account.
Later, the police traced the bank account to Dehradun branch of the bank. The bank authorities told the police that they had received over 40 complaints pertaining to the particular account in the last week. However, the address given by the owner was fake and even the guarantor was fake, making police investigations fall flat.
No success

The Cyber Crime Cell has registered atleast four cases of online job scam in the past. However, none of the cases have been solved. One such case reported in 2008 was of Surinder Chauhan, a resident of Sector 32, who lost Rs 50,000 after he responded to a fraudulent email. A case was registered on January 16, 2008. The sender lured Chauhan by asking him to send his resume for a lucrative job in Mela International - a hotel in the UK. Later, he received a reply, stating that he had been selected and was asked to deposit a sum of Rs 15,000. After he transferred the amount, a caller from the UK asked him to deposit another Rs 35,000. The case has been marked untraced.