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With 3 cases in a week, residents wary of ATM cloning gang in Doon
With at least three cases ATM fraud being reported in the last seven days in Dehradun, residents here suspect that a card cloning gang is active in the city
With at least three cases ATM fraud being reported in the last seven days in Dehradun, residents here suspect that a card cloning gang is active in the city.
In the past week, police have registered three cases of suspected ATM cloning. The three victims have lost a total ₹3.85 lakh in unauthorised ATM transactions while the card was in their possession.
In one incident, a case was registered in Dalanwala police station on June 12 by the complainant, Kanchan Negi, a resident of Curzon Road area in Dehradun. She stated in her complaint that she lost ₹2.10 lakh from her bank account in unauthorised transactions between June 1- 3. She got to know about them through SMS on her mobile phone.
In another incident, the complainant, Vikky Ghanshaila, lodged a complaint on June 7 at Kotwali police station in Rishikesh town, in which he stated that he lost ₹25,000 from his account. In the third incident on June 18, another victim who did not want to be named, a resident of Nehru Colony locality of the city, lost ₹1.50 lakh from his account in 10 transactions while his ATM card was with him.
The investigation officer of the case in the Nehru Colony locality, sub-inspector Dhaniram Purohit, said that prima facie it seems to be a case of ATM cloning. “Based on the complaint, we started investigating the case. Further probe will be done after recording the victim’s statement,” said Purohit.
In August last year, the city police had nabbed three men from Maharashtra for allegedly cloning the ATM cards of at least 96 Dehradun residents.
“Now, banks are promoting ATM transactions instead of branch-based transactions. If such incidents take place then the public is bound to fear such transactions,” said a 42-year-old resident of city and an ATM card user, Surendra Nautiyal.
Cyber-expert, Hemraj Singh Chouhan said that the only way to avoid becoming a victim of ATM cloning is to be extra vigilant at ATM kiosks. “One needs to be vigilant by looking around for any suspicious things at the ATM like a pinhole camera or a camera above the keypad which is unusual at any ATM. If they see something suspicious, they should avoid doing any transaction at such ATMs,” said Chouhan adding that one should use the new chip-based ATM cards which are safer and secure in comparison to magnetic strip-based cards.
“One should try to use ATM where the card is inside the machine during the entire transaction, as its almost impossible to clone cards from those machines,” added Chouhan.
