Digit-hell: 70-year-old Delhi woman loses Rs 7cr in 9 days to cyber frauds; cops save Rs 2.9cr

NEW DELHI: Scammers posing as police and Enforcement Directorate officers kept a 70-year-old woman under digital arrest in her house in south Delhi's Greater Kailash-I for nine days earlier this month and duped her of nearly Rs 7 crore, days after an elderly couple in GK-II had been conned of Rs 15 crore in a similar manner. Police have managed to put Rs 2.9 crore out of Rs 7 crore on hold.The woman, who lives alone, received a call on Jan 5. The caller claimed a SIM card issued in her name was being used for fraudulent activities. She pleaded her innocence, but the caller firmly told her that either she or her children were on the wrong side of the law, police sources said on Thursday. She was shifted to a video call and asked if there were other people in the house. She said her daughter lives in Gurgaon and son in Australia. When the scammers came to know that a domestic help comes to the house daily, they told the woman to shut its gate and not tell anyone that they had called, the sources said.Over the days, the fraudsters gleaned details of her financial assets. After learning that she had around Rs 7 crore in fixed deposits, they posed as Mumbai Police officers and levelled false laundering charges against her, before adding to the call their accomplices who claimed to be ED officers.The woman was kept under constant surveillance through a second mobile phone, with a video call running round the clock, monitoring her movements throughout the period of the digital arrest. She was forced to carry out three transactions — Rs 4 crore and Rs 1.3 crore on Jan 9, followed by Rs 1.6 crore on Jan 12. The money was deposited in bank accounts controlled by the scammers, the source said.They even tutored her what to say if bank officials questioned her about the transactions. When a bank staffer asked her the reason for the large withdrawals, she said she was transferring the money to her daughter. The official did not ask any further question.One day, the woman told the scammers she was not feeling well and her daughter will visit her. They instructed her to immediately delete all chats, messages and details of the bank transactions, warning that keeping them could land her in further trouble.On the morning of Jan 14, she received a fake court order of Rs 2 crore that immediately made her suspicious because the fraudsters had told her that their "investigation" was over. They explained her that courts sometimes require additional payments. Sensing something was wrong, the woman contacted a relative, who told her she had been conned and alerted cops. "We approached a bank and got Rs 2.85 crore frozen," police said, adding that a case was registered with Intelligence Fusion and Strategic Operations of Delhi Police on Jan 14.