Thane: 49-Year-Old Woman Loses ₹10.35 Lakh In Online Task Fraud By Scammers Posing As Amazon HR On Telegram

Mumbai: A 49-year-old woman has fallen prey to scammers who had created a bogus HR group and Amazon Part-Time India channel on Telegram and had ended up losing Rs 10.35 lakh in online task fraud.

According to the police, the victim is a resident of Thane. Since the victim is currently unemployed she was looking for a work from home opportunity. On September 19, the victim's mobile number got to a Telegram group named "HR-336". The admin of the said group gave details about how people paid and completed certain online tasks and earned a lot of profit.

Then the admin then asked the victim to contact an "Amazon HR Recruiter" on Telegram and shared her Telegram user-ID as well. The victim was then made to fill up a form and register and was then asked to join the channel Amazon Part Time-India.

Later one of the scammers started giving tasks to the victim by sending personal messages on Telegram. Accordingly the victim completed the said task on 18/09/2024 and on paying Rs 7000 in a bank account shared by the scammer, the victim earned Rs 10127.

After having received the money, the victim trusted the said earning opportunity. From September 18 till September 21, the victim completed several tasks given by the scammers and ended up sending Rs 10.35 lakh in different beneficiary bank accounts shared by the scammers.

However, the victim did not get any money for completing tasks, instead the scammers repeatedly asked her to send more money to different accounts.

Later, the victim informed her husband about the said incident after which she learnt that she had been duped. She then approached the police and got an offence registered in the matter.

The victim in her complaint to the Thane police has given user-ID details of the scammers, bogus Telegram group and channel and beneficiary bank account details.

A case has been registered by the police under sections 318 (cheating) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and sections 66C (identity theft), 66D (cheating by personation by using computer resource) of the Information Technology Act.