Hyderabad Police nabs cyber fraudster for duping people on pretext of providing jobs, loans

Hyderabad police have apprehended one inter-state cyber fraudster who used to dupe people by using their bank credentials on the pretext of providing loans and jobs.

Anjani Kumar, Commissioner of Police, Hyderabad city, stated that the accused, Mareti Srinivasa Rao used the credentials of the victims, like OTP's (one time password), bank account details and earned illegal money.

"Rao used to introduce himself by false names to the job and loan seekers. He used to claim to be a representative of a finance company who provides loans on low interest. Rao is wanted in more than 20 cyber cases in more than two Telugu states," said Kumar.

Rao used to inform the victims that in order to process the loan, the applicant needs to show the minimum bank balance of Rs. 10,000 for every Rs. 1,00,000 or Rs. 20,000 for every Rs. 2,00,000 loan to be given.

"He then used to collect the copies of bank passbooks, ATM cards and PIN numbers from the callers via WhatsApp, and then assured them that the loan application has been approved," said Kumar.

"In the meantime, he used to process an online payment using the credentials of the victims. Once the OTP was sent to the victim's phone number, Rao used to obtain the OTP stating that the amount will be credited immediately. Believing the accused, innocent people used to share the OTPs," he added.

In a few cases, Rao used online tools to route the messages received by the victim's mobile to the app and used to collect the OTPs even without the knowledge of the victim about the receipt of the SMS.

According to the police from the past few years, Rao has duped over 150 people with an amount of over two crores. For luring people he frequently used to give ads in the vernacular newspapers, in various districts of two Telugu states.