Imposter posing as Russian astronaut defrauds Japanese woman of Rs 24 lakh, peculiar ‘romance scam’ tale goes viral

Chandigarh, October 12

A story of an international scam is doing the rounds across social media platforms where an imposter, who posed himself as Russian astronaut, allegedly duped a Japanese woman of around 4.4 million yen (Rs 24.8 lakh) at the pretext of marrying her after returning from space station.

As per a report of Japan’s TV Asahi, the 65-year-old Japanese woman met this conman on Instagram. His profile was flooded with photos of space and astronauts.

The due started exchanging chats on frequent basis and later shifted to a Japanese messaging application, Line.

After some time, the man proposed to move to Japan and marry her. He told the woman that he needed money to return to earth insisting that he had to pay a landing fee for the rocket which could fly him to Japan.

The buoyant woman sent 4.4 million yen to the man. As he continued to make further demands, she started to get suspicious and ultimately filed a complaint upon being assured that she had been conned.

The Japanese police are investigating the case under the ‘romance scam’ category.