Bengaluru Woman Exposes Money-Swiping Scam Via 'Bank Screenshots'

Online fraud is increasing in today's world where digital transactions have become the norm. Scammers are getting smarter. They use clever tricks to deceive people and steal their money, like sending fake emails, setting up bogus websites, and using sneaky software to swipe your sensitive info like credit card numbers and passwords. Now, a new scamming trend is on the rise, shared by a Bengaluru woman, named Aditi Chopra.

Ms Chopra shared an incident on X, formerly Twitter, recounting how she narrowly avoided falling victim to a financial scam that preys on unsuspecting people through SMS. She detailed how she was in the middle of an office call when she received a phone call from “an elderly sounding guy” claiming to need to transfer money to her father. The man said in Hindi, “Aditi, dear, I needed to send money to your father but he is not available, so he asked me to send it to you. Dear, please check, is this your number?” 

He cited issues with his own bank account and requested Aditi's help in receiving the funds. Shortly after the call, Ms Chopra received SMS alerts, which seemingly showed confirmation of her getting funds into her account. “I first received an SMS mentioning an INR 10k credit, then an INR 30k credit, all while he's on the call,” she wrote on X. 

The caller then informed Ms Chopra of an alleged mistake, claiming to have sent ₹30,000 instead of ₹3,000. "Dear, I was supposed to send only INR 3,000, but mistakenly sent INR 30,000. Please return the extra money. I am standing at the doctor's place, I need to give him the money,” he allegedly said.

Upon close inspection, Ms Chopra noticed that the SMS alerts did not come from a legitimate bank, but rather from a 10-digit phone number. She recognised the red flags, saying, “Of course when I called back in a minute's time after checking my accounts, I was blocked.”

She further added, “One could falter and give in but (I know) my dad, he over explains everything and triple checks in matters of money, whatever be the amount,” claiming “he would have called beforehand and given me more context than needed.”

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Ms Chopra urged others to be wary of similar scams, stating, “Always check your actual bank account on a separate device and never go by any SMSes. That system is very easily gameable.”