Cyber frauds create duplicate hotel website to dupe tourists

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Shimla, April 23

Cyber criminals are copying websites of hotels and opening accounts in their names to dupe tourists. “Cyber fraudsters have put up a parallel website and opened a bank account in the name of our hotel,” says Anupam Kapoor, owner of Hotel Sangeet in Shimla.

“We lodged a complaint with the cyber police here after a customer told us that he had deposited Rs 2,000 as advance into an account opened in the hotel’s name in Federal Bank, Chandigarh, for booking a room from May 22 to 24,” he says.

“About 12 to 15 customers, who have been duped of Rs 2 lakh to Rs 2.5 lakh, have reported the fraud to us,” says Kapoor. Earlier, tourists were misled to deposit money on the pretext of advance booking in a bank account in Jaipur,” he adds.

“While cyber criminals are running a website in the name of our hotel, our website is not visible. Whenever a customer or tourist searches for our hotel, the duplicate website opens,” he claims.