Bhubaneswar: An old man from Bhubaneswar lost Rs 40.51 lakh to an unknown woman, who was friends with social media by introducing himself as a rich woman from London, and made him nominate his account with HSBC banks in England in their online Rendezvous days.
The problem was revealed recently after the cyber police station from the state crime branch began an investigation to receive complaints from him.
The 65-year-old victim, who requested anonymity, retired from the state water resources department as an executive assistant engineer in 2017.
He lives near the Chhak garage in the old city area here.
In his complaint, the victim said he had touched the woman, who had identified himself as Susan Morgan from London, in 2018-19.
They will often chat on whatsapp.
After taking him to confidence, Susan had told him that he had declared it as a nomination in his HSBC bank account.
In January last year, the old man had received a call from One Michael Laurent Jefferson, who allegedly posed as the HSBC Bank operation manager.
Jefferson tells him that Susan has died and in accordance with the policy of the bank, the candidate in this case) will receive the money.
The elderly man was also told that Bank Susan’s account had more balance than Rs 2 Crore.
The victim then received another call from another man, who had introduced himself as John Flint, Head of the Executive Director of the HSBC Bank.
The fraudsters insisted that the victim sent around Rs 50 Lakh as the processing fee to receive Susan’s money from his account.
He was also asked to send his documents to verify his identity.
Without verifying unknown caller credentials, who spoke in a fluent British accent, unsuspecting victims had agreed to send them the amount they requested.
“We have found that the man transferred Rs 40.51 Lakh from January 9, 2020 to 6 February 2021 to various bank accounts distributed by fraudsters.
Unknown accusations have used English Sims.
Efforts to track them,” said a branch official Crime.
Last month, the crime had received a similar complaint from a 68-year-old Kendrapada man after a unknown woman from Berlin allegedly deceived him from almost Rs 57.4 lakh with the pretext of sending him a prize that was expensive on his birthday.