Cyber criminals target people on pretext of Covid-19 vaccine registration

Tribune News Service

Nikhil Bhardwaj

Ludhiana, February 6

Changing the modus operandi according to the prevalent trend, cyber criminals have now started cheating people on the pretext of registration for Covid-19 vaccine.

The police have also started receiving complaints where people lost money to cyber criminals by sharing one-time passwords (OTPs) or by downloading unsafe apps.

To make people aware of the fraud, the Ludhiana Commissionerate has started posting informative graphics on social media.

The recent image shared by the police on their official Facebook page reads, “Beware of coronavirus vaccine registration fraud. Don’t believe in calls in the name of Covid-19 vaccine registration. Don’t share OTP received on your mobile phone and avoid sharing credit/debit cards details with strangers”.

A senior police official said: “Cyber criminals buy dump of mobile phone numbers from anti-social elements or scan phone numbers posted on social media accounts”.

“Due to the pandemic, innocent people easily fall prey to fraudsters. People think they might have been approached by some government employee for the registration of the Covid vaccine,” a police official said, adding that after taking people into confidence, criminals send an OTP or a payment link on their mobile phone. When people share OTP with the caller or click on the payment link, money gets deducted from their account.

Cyber criminals convince elderly persons by telling them that if they do telephonic registration, health officials will visit their house to administer the Covid vaccine and they don’t have to visit any centre for the same. They ask people to download remote desktop app to complete the formalities for the registration of Covid vaccine. Once the user downloads the app, entire mobile data gets visible to the fraudsters and they can easily access the OTP and withdraw money through apps.

“Most of the people use payment apps these days and their mobile numbers are linked to these apps. Criminals can send OTP by identifying UPI ID easily,” said a police official.

Ignore calls for KYC to cast vote: Cyber cell

“Cyber criminals may call people to do their KYC required for casting votes in the upcoming Assembly elections. People should avoid such calls or they should report the matter to the cyber wing if they receive any such call,” said the Cyber Cell. Mandeep Singh, a transporter, said, “I received a call from an unknown number on Monday. The caller asked me to share OTP sent on my mobile so that mandatory KYC for casting vote in the Assembly elections can be done. Suspecting a fraud, I disconnected the call”.

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