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Hackers siphon off over Rs 17 lakh in 200 transactions from Uttarakhand farmer’s account
The farmer and the bank came to know about the fraud when the farmer approached the bank for the entry of transactions into his passbook.
Cyber hackers allegedly managed to siphon off Rs 17.24-lakh through around 200 transactions in last 11 months from a farmer’s account in Khatima of US Nagar in Uttarakhand. Ironically, neither the farmer nor the bank knew about the alleged fraudulent transactions, an official said.
The farmer and the bank came to know about the fraud when the farmer approached the bank for the entry of transactions into his passbook, officials said.
Fifty-seven-year-old Gursharan Singh, a farmer living in Pratappur village under police station Khatima in US Nagar has a saving account in the Oriental Bank of Commerce (OBC) since 2003.
“Since I have accounts in other banks also, I hardly operated the OBC account,” Singh said.
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“I had gone to the bank on June 18 for the entry of transactions into my passbook. I had made only 5-6 transactions in the last one year. But to my surprise, bank officials handed over three additional passbooks with a large number of entries,” said Singh.
He said, “When I went through the passbook, I learnt that around 200 transactions had been made since August 2019, which were not done by me. Over 4 to 5 transactions of Rs 7,900 each were made by me. Total Rs 17,24,565 had been withdrawn from my account.”
“The farmer has lodged a complaint with us claiming fraudulent transactions made in his account. I have informed about these transactions to our Fraud Monitoring Cell (FMC), Gurugram, as well as a police cyber cell in Rudrapur,” Bhuwan Joshi, branch manager, OBC, Khatima said.
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“The farmer’s ATM card has been seized/blocked after his complaint. Those behind these transactions will be known after the investigation of FMC and police cyber cell are done. I can’t say anything further at this stage,” he added
Singh said he didn’t even receive any message of transactions on his mobile from the bank that could have alerted him. Transactions were made regularly without any alert message or OTP alerts (one-time password), he added.
“I have received messages of the transactions made by me in last months on my mobile, but surprisingly, I didn’t get any message or OTP alerts for these fraudulent transactions. I have handed over my complaints to Khatima police as well as the police cyber cell and am I am waiting for their response,” Singh said.
Himanshu Pant, in-charge, police cyber cell, Udham Singh Nagar said, “We have received complaints from the farmer and have started investigating the case.“
“The transactions have been made through mobile, not by the ATM. Since transactions were made for a long time, it will take some time to investigate this matter,” he added.
