Gurugram-based importer/exported duped of USD 400,000

A city-based private company was allegedly duped of $400,000 by an unidentified person, who sought transfer of the money through an email address similar to a China-based client of the company’s, the police said on Thursday.

According to the police, the complainant company imports and exports electronic components. It procures the supplies from Chinese manufacturers and sells them in India and other countries.

The incident took place in December 2018 and after verification of the complaint lodged by the director of the company, the cybercrime police registered a case on Wednesday.

“A few days ago, we got an email from an address of the Chinese supplier, which was almost identical (it had just a minor one-letter difference, which normally one would likely miss) stating that there is a change in the banking information as they have moved to a new bank and future payments should be done to this new account. My accounts team got scammed by that fraudulent email and started wiring the payments to this new bank account, and ended up wiring approximately USD 400-500 K to this new account, until they realised that it was a fraud email and the money was being sent to a wrong account,” the company’s director said in the first information report (FIR).

Police said that when the complainant company checked, the bank account was allegedly based in Cincinnati of Ohio state in the United States of America (USA).

Suresh, station house officer (SHO), cybercrime police station said, “Police are investigating the case.”

A case was registered under sections 66 and 66D of Information Technology (Amendment) Act and section 420 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) at the cybercrime police station on Thursday.