A sitting Bombay High Court judge last week, filed a complaint with the Mumbai Police alleging that she has been duped in an online credit card fraud to the tune of Rs 6 lakhs.
The female judge, lodged a First Information Report (FIR) against an unknown person, who claimed to be a representative of the HDFC Bank's credit card department and defrauded her of Rs 6 lakhs.
According to her FIR lodged with the Cuffe Parade Police Station on February 28, the judge has stated that she was trying to redeem the reward points she got on her credit card. For the said purpose, she searched for the contact number of the bank's credit card customer care, however, the toll free number could not be reached. She then came across another contact number on Google, where she called and was answered by a man claiming to be a representative of the HDFC Bank's credit card department.
The said person, after initially speaking with the judge, sent her an 18 MB apk file called credit card.apk.
"However, the said file didn't open on my iPhone. I was suggested to download the said file on an Android phone and I used my domestic help's phone for downloading the said apk file after inserting my sim in it. After that I was told to add the credit card details for redeeming the reward points," the judge stated in her FIR.
Immediately after that, the judge, started receiving mails stating that an amount totaling Rs 6.02 lakhs had been debited through various transactions.
"Then I realized that I was being cheated. I immediately called HDFC Bank's credit card customer care and blocked the said credit card and immediately called the cyber helpline number 1930 and filed a complaint. The unknown person by falsely claiming to be from the credit card department of HDFC Bank, gained unauthorised access to my mobile phone without my permission, illegally misused the sensitive information credit card, and defrauding me by diverting a total of Rs. 6,02,566/- from my credit card account to different places," the judge stated.
On her complaint, the Cuffe Parade Police has lodged an FIR under sections 66 (Unauthorized access to a computer system, downloading data without permission, or introducing viruses with malicious intent), 66C(Misusing another person's electronic signature, password, or unique identification feature) and 66D (Using a communication device or computer to impersonate another (real or fictitious) person to deceive or extract money/information) of the Information & Technology Act.
The police has also invoked sections 318(4) (cheating), 319(2) (punishment for cheating) and section 3(5) (common intention) of the Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita.