A 60-year-old contractor from Navi Mumbai has allegedly been duped of more than Rs 52 lakh after being lured to invest in cryptocurrency for higher returns, police said on Thursday.
Some fraudsters contacted the victim, resident of Vashi in Navi Mumbai, over phone and gained his trust by projecting gains in cryptocurrency investment through a fake trading website, they said.
The victim subsequently transferred more than Rs 52 lakh into various bank accounts over the last four months, an official from Cyber Police Station in Navi Mumbai said.
However, when the victim tried to withdraw the money, he was blocked and lost access to the website, the police said.
Based on the victim's complaint, the police registered a case against four persons on Tuesday under relevant legal provisions.
As per the findings, the website used in the fraud was not registered with any regulatory authority, and the domain creator as well as holders of the bank accounts, in which the victim transferred the money, were being treated as primary suspects, the official said.
The police appealed appeal to the public to be extremely cautious about investment schemes promising high returns, especially through unverified websites or unsolicited communication "No legitimate investment platform operates this way. People should verify credentials thoroughly before transferring funds online," the official said.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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