New Delhi (Agency): The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has filed charges against five individuals for a high-level digital scam, where they purportedly imitated Microsoft’s tech support, subsequently swindling a US citizen out of her substantial retirement savings of $400,000 (equivalent to Rs 3.37 crore).
Friday’s public announcement by the CBI informed that Praful Gupta, Sarita Gupta, Kunal Almadi, Gaurav Pahwa, all hailing from Delhi, and Rishabh Dixit from Kanpur have been officially charged with fraud. The case was initiated based on credible leads received from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
The CBI subsequently executed searches at properties located in Dilshad Garden and Janakpuri in Delhi, as well as Kidwai Nagar in Kanpur.
The intricate digital heist unfolded as Lisa Roth, the victim, found her laptop to be compromised. A prompt on her screen led her to call a number, where the scammer feigned ties with Microsoft and informed her of suspicious wire transfers from her retirement account.
The FIR outlined that the imposter suggested she contact Fidelity Investments. Roth, adhering to the instructions, was then duped into moving money from her Fidelity Investments account to a supposedly safer account, as advised by the alleged Microsoft employee.
As the plot thickened, the con artist managed to remotely access Roth’s system during the call, skillfully rerouting $300,000 (Rs 2.48 crore as per the current exchange rate) from her Fidelity Investments Account to her First State Bank account.
The scam artist proceeded to open an account on Binance.com under Roth’s name, convincing her to wire the funds to an account labelled “Prime Trust”. Roth acted in accordance with the fraudulent advice, only to face a declined transaction due to a minor error — she had erroneously penned down ‘Prime Title’ instead of ‘Prime Trust’.
The CBI alleges that after the first failed attempt, the fraudster, undeterred, contacted Roth again, recommending the transfer of an additional sum from her Fidelity Investments account to her First State Bank account. The aim was to secure a total of $400,000 in a safer account.
Upon securing unauthorized remote control over Roth’s system, the impostor set up an OKcoin account for Roth using her mobile number and email ID and directed her to transfer the sizable amount there. Falling prey to the scammer’s deceitful counsel, Roth transferred the $400,000 into the OKcoin account on June 7 of the previous year.
When she accessed her OKcoin account several weeks later, she was met with an empty account. The CBI FIR reports that the looted funds had been cleverly transformed into cryptocurrency and further transferred to the accused quintet’s Binance and FTX wallets