Mumbai Congress MLA's e-mail account hacked

An e-mail account of a Mumbai MLA was today hacked by a fraudster, who sent fake mails to people on the former's contact list seeking USD 3,000 saying that the amount was required to meet the medical expenses of his relative's family "which met with an accident", police said.
Ashok Jadhav, a Congress MLA from Andheri West constituency, today complained in writing at Bandra Cyber Cell police station that his personal e-mail account was hacked and mails were sent to all his contacts, a police officer said.
After reading the mail, his panicked friends ranging from politicians to businessman replied to the mail, while some even called up the MLA, police said.

One of those who first rung up Jadhav to extend financial help was senior Congress leader Gurudas Kamat. However, Jadhav was in for shock when Kamat told him about the mail.
The first mail sent to Jadhav's contacts by the hacker reads, "Sorry to bother you, please I need your urgent help and was wondering if I can get one from you."
And those replied to the mail received another mail in which the fraudster impersonating self as MLA Jadhav sought USD 3,000.

Indicating that the MLA was abroad, the second mail reads, "My cousin and his family had an accident here in India and his wife who was driving at the time is already dead. I need to pay the hospital bill of my cousin and his three year old son whose leg was broken. I will pay back once am back home next week."

The mail further added, "I didn't come with my phone cause I was in a rush, so I currently have no access to phone calls from as it will take up to 72 hours before I can get an IDDS service registered in my name, else I would have love to call. Please let me know if you can help. Get back to me as soon as you can. Please keep this between us."
The MLA immediately rushed to Bandra's Cyber Cell police and complained to them about the mails.
Preliminary probe suggested that the hacker used proxy server as it shows that the e-mail accounts had been accessed from United Kingdom and Delhi on three different occasions, police sources said.