There are several safeguards you can take to prevent theft from your home or office: closed circuit television cameras, reinforced locks, burglar alarms... Storing cash and jewelry in a safe deposit box is a further alternative. But what happens when the thief arrives electronically through the airwaves and nestles in your mobile? Today’s burglars may be next door to you, or in another city or state or country. You don’t know what they look like or where they are based. They do not have to break your lock, or threaten you with a knife or gun to make you hand over your valuables. You do it unknowingly and willingly.
The thief is unconcerned, whether you are rich or poor, young or elderly, a homemaker or a student, ill or invalid. They don’t know or care where you live or what you do. They operate impersonally, electronically to deprive you of your hard earned monies and savings. Their victims are often people who are trusting, law abiding and kind. Who is going to track down these con artists? Who is going to retrieve the hundreds or thousands or lakhs and maybe even more that is fraudulently siphoned from your bank account, credit card or any other payment facility?
The police may lend a sympathetic ear, but will they register your complaint? File a first information report? Make efforts to track down the cybercriminals? Assist you to recover even a portion of your wealth that was pilfered? Unlikely, though not impossible. If you are influential and well-connected that helps. Otherwise you’ll end up as just one more statistic on the list of the duped.
Individual Parsis have been targeted countless times but recently the cybercriminals went a step further. They hacked into or obtained the contacts of several prominent Parsis who are known for their philanthropic activities.
Warned Parzor founder director Dr Shernaz Cama in an email dated July 5, 2023, "Kindly note that several Parsi community leaders, including myself, have had their emails and mobile numbers compromised. This scam seems to be targeting Parsis across the world. The fraudsters are using email addresses close to those of well-known community members, with slight alteration such as a missing alphabet.
"These people are aware of the (World Zarathushti Chamber of Commerce) meeting in London of Zoroastrians from across the world and therefore request recipients to help out with charity/urgent monetary transactions for community affairs in India. These are to be ignored and deleted immediately. This fraud, which has already cheated us of money, has been reported to the cyber security teams in our various cities."
In one case the invite was to attend a party to celebrate the graduation ceremony of a person. When offering congratulations and inquiring who the person was, a reply stated, a niece and went on to read, "I just learnt that my nephew, Mujeeb, is returning to school (Syracuse University) today from Delhi. I’ve been trying to send him Rs 27,000 to get some things to bring for us, but on several attempts, I did not receive an OTP (one time password) on my phone to complete the transfer. I could use your help if it won’t hassle you in any way. As soon as SBI (State Bank of India) fixes the OTP issue, I’ll reimburse you."
A similar scam but this time citing a 50th wedding anniversary in London along with photographs of the couple dancing was sent out. When the recipient replied that he would be unable to attend but wished the couple well, he received a message requesting money be sent to his nephew to bring some items for the couple. A collage of family photos was attached.
The person targeted asked for the nephew’s bank details and sent the amount. The crooks then asked for his bank details so they could ostensibly return the amount. Fortunately, a relative alerted the victim that he was being conned. If the bank details had been provided, larger sums could have been siphoned off.
Because people post so many of their personal details, photographs, whereabouts on social media, it’s easy for fraudsters to obtain intimate details.
"Email and social media communications have become an integral part of modern day life," noted cyber crime expert Mehrzaad Mogrelia (see "Countering cybercrime," Parsiana, October 7-20, 2022.) "However, this has also become one of the most common mediums for cyber criminals to commit crimes like data theft, identity theft, online scams (job fraud, romance scam), laundering money from one place to another." Eighty percent of targeted cyber crimes take place through web applications like Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, among others, Mogrelia noted citing a 2021 Data Breach Investigation Report by software giant Verizon.
He advised readers: "Keep an eye out for any irregularities in the sender’s name, email address or body of the letter. Irregularities like spelling mistakes, poorly constructed emails, strange email addresses that appear to be genuine, unrealistic offers are some of the major indicators that the email might not be genuine… If a friend or family member has an ostensible emergency, we should cross-check by calling them up to know if the situation exists before transferring any funds to their Paypal or Paytm accounts." Avoid disclosing personal details on social media profiles in order to protect your profile and avoid leakage of confidential information.
Keeping lower limits on your credit card account, having a second bank account which is not operated electronically but where larger amounts may be kept, or keeping your money in fixed deposits, are ways of lessening your losses. Remember no one is safe. It’s only a matter of time before your turn comes. Government agencies don’t have the ability to keep track of all the scams and probably lack the will to battle this new scourge on a war footing. As cyber crime affects a relatively smaller, literate and somewhat more well-off section of society, it is not a political priority. All of us have to fend for ourselves.