Probe on into another banking fraud in Kozhikode

Even as the police has intensified their search for a man who allegedly swindled ₹40,000 from the account of a retired government employee using Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools, another case has surfaced in the city involving an elderly man who lost ₹4.5 lakh to online scammers.

The operators behind the new fraud bypassed five layers of security including One Time Password (OTP) to withdraw money in four attempts.

According to police sources, the amount was siphoned off from the complainant’s fixed deposit while he was trying to get a refund for a cancelled railway reservation ticket. He is said to have initiated the refund procedures on a phishing website after clicking multiple links on the website of Indian Railways.

In the preliminary inquiry, it was found that the complainant had installed a third party mobile application as instructed by the fraudsters to get the refund of his cancelled reservation ticket. He reportedly followed their instructions after getting a refund of ₹300.

“As the phone was formatted to avoid further withdrawal, the enquiry cell will have to retrieve the lost data for further investigation. Efforts are on to do the same,” said a police officer associated with the investigation. He said that it was the first time that a fixed deposit was cancelled and withdrawn after bypassing multi-layer security codes.