A family in south Kolkata’s Gariahat area allegedly lost Rs 42,635 to cheats who had asked them to scan a QR code to get a new LPG cylinder connection, police said.
The family had shifted to their new apartment on Garcha Road in Gariahat in the last week of February and was in need of an LPG connection.
They tried calling a gas agency at Dover Terrace whose landline number they found on the Internet. But there was no response. They then dialled a mobile phone number which they found on the same web page, Arik Banerjee, one of the family members, told The Telegraph.
The person who received the call on the mobile phone informed Banerjee that there was no need to visit the agency’s office on Motilal Nehru Road off Hazra Road and all formalities would be done online. The person gave them another mobile number claiming that the formalities for new connections were being done through that number.
The second person Banerjee spoke to sought all identity documents before asking him to make the payment for the new connection by scanning a QR code.
Banerjee, a lawyer, paid Rs 5,600 by scanning the QR code that was sent on his mobile phone.
“Immediately after the payment, the person, who was speaking in Hindi, told me that the link had expired and I needed to make a fresh payment through another QR code that would be sent to me. The money had by then debited from my back account. That raised my suspicion and I refused to scan a second QR code,” said Banerjee.
“The man told me that before I make the new payment, the sum I had already paid would be sent back. All I had to do was to click on another QR code,” said Banerjee.
“I agreed and scanned the QR code with my phone.”
Within a few minutes, Banerjee said, he received text messages of money being debited from his bank account. In total, Rs 37,035 was debited.
Banerjee tried calling the number but there was no response.
Realising the fraud that amounted to Rs 42,635, Banerjee and his wife went to the gas dealer’s office only to be told that the number they had dialled did not belong to them.
The family lodged complaints with the cyber police station at Lalbazar and with Gariahat police station.
“We did not get any refund till date,” Banerjee said.
A senior police officer in Lalbazar who works in the cyber wing said such cases “take time” as it is difficult to recover the money which is transferred through multiple bank accounts and e-wallets within a few minutes of its transfer from the victim’s account.
“By the time the police come into the picture, the money stolen from a bank account is withdrawn from an ATM in some other part of the country, far from the place where the victim resides. It is very difficult to recover money in such cases,” said the officer.
Checklist
• Avoid scanning QR codes for making payments
• Cheats camouflage the amount to be transferred as a passcode attached to a hashtag. Clicking on that hashtag while scanning a QR code could lead to loss of money mentioned in the “passcode”
• Check the name of the recipient before transferring money through a QR code. Ideally, the money should be transferred to the company from where you are making a purchase and not to any individual
