One of the cybercriminals posed as ex Delhi Police chief Rakesh Asthana. (Representational)
In a case of sextortion, a 75-year-old resident of Delhi's Vasant Kunj was cheated of Rs 7.34 lakh by a group of cybercriminals, one of whom posed as former Delhi Police commissioner Rakesh Asthana.
The cyber scammers trapped KN Joshi by using the modus operandi of obscene video chat followed by a call for extortion.
Mr Joshi, in his complaint with the Delhi Police, has said that on January 15, he received a message saying "hello" from a woman who introduced herself as Anjali Sharma.
She then asked for a video call and appeared nude, he said in his complaint, adding, "In a few minutes the call was disconnected."
Two days later on January 17, she shared a morphed obscene video of Mr Joshi and threatened that if he didn't pay Rs 61,000, she would make it viral on social media. Mr Joshi said that he immediately blocked the number.
Then on January 25, he missed a call from an unknown number. "I called back on the number and the person told me that he is Rakesh Asthana, Police Commissioner of Delhi. He said that he got information about the video call with Anjali and asked me whether you have contacted her," Mr Joshi told the police.
"I told him that I never met her. He said that Anjali is a drug smuggler whose actual name is Neha and shared a copy of the FIR. He said that the video is going viral on YouTube and gave me the number of Dhyaneshwar Bajirao," he said.
When Mr Joshi contacted Bajirao, he demanded Rs 21,500 and Rs 43,000 through a digital wallet to get those videos deleted and also assured him that he would get back the money.
"This made me gain some trust that they are actual police. He also shared a copy of the email stating that the video was deleted," the FIR, registered on April 25, reads.
Mr Joshi thought that his plight would be over after paying Rs 64,500 in two installments but the fraudsters kept asking for more money on one excuse or the other.
The person who posed himself as Rakesh Asthana and his gang cooked up bizarre stories around Anjali to extort as much money they could from Mr Joshi as possible. He introduced Mr Joshi to a person called Ajay Kumar Ghagat and told him that Ghagat is an ACP and Mr Joshi should pay him Rs 2 lakh for "chai pani" (tea and snacks -- a euphemism for bribe).
Then the ACP shared a video of a dead body to Mr Joshi and told him that Anjali's mother has committed suicide and so he should pay Rs 4 lakh into her account.
A police officer, privy to the investigation, said that Mr Joshi paid Rs 7,34,500 in total on three different dates.
The police officer added, "In these types of cybercrime, fraudsters use recorded obscene videos of women which they play on video call to people. Initially people think that they have got a call from a woman. In the recorded call, these women ask people to undress or indulge into some obscene act. When they do that, these criminals record it and share it back to the people threatening that if they don't pay money, it would be made viral on social media."
According to him, there have been cases in which people merely received calls but refused to indulge in any obscene act. "Even then, they recorded the video of such people, morphed it and made it obscene. They shared it back to people asking them to pay, otherwise they would make it viral on social media," he said.
"They use the name of senior police officers to threaten people. In some cases, they dressed as cops and made video calls asking them to pay huge money," he added. The police have launched a probe hoping to get some breakthrough very soon.
Rakesh Asthana retired as the Delhi Police commissioner in July 2022.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)