Ahmedabad: A Rs 3 crore corporate transfer was completed before the employee realised that his ‘boss’ was actually a fraudster. The WhatsApp account used the director’s name and photograph, while the voice giving the instructions sounded familiar. But the employee’s immediate call to the real director exposed the deception. The company immediately alerted police, who froze Rs 2.9 crore within 30 minutes. Their swift response helped the company eventually recover Rs 2.9 crore.The incident came to light on Aug 18 when an employee of an Ahmedabad-based pharmaceutical company received messages from a WhatsApp account using his director’s identity. The number was different from the director’s actual phone number, but since the name and photograph were the same, it did not immediately raise suspicion, Ahmedabad rural police said. The messages appeared to be part of the company’s routine communication, and the person giving the instructions sounded quite like the boss.Then, the fraud boss allegedly told the employee to make an urgent financial transfer of Rs 3 crore from the company’s bank account to the account numbers he provided.The employee had little reason to find the request or the amount unusual. According to police, this kind of communication between senior management and employees was normal. The company also had a transaction limit of Rs 15 crore, making a Rs 3 crore transfer seem plausible. Trusting what he believed was an instruction from the director, the employee did as asked.The scam was exposed moments after the transfer.As he normally did after completing a financial task assigned by his senior, the employee called the director to update him. The director was surprised and told him that he had not given any such instruction.That is when the employee realised that the WhatsApp account was being operated by an impersonator.
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The company moved quickly and filed an online cybercrime complaint immediately. A case was registered at the cybercrime police station under Ahmedabad rural police.DySP Tapan Dodiya said police immediately began tracking the financial trail. Their intervention resulted in Rs 2.9 crore being frozen within 30 minutes of the complaint. The fraudsters could manage to withdraw only Rs 6 lakh.After completing legal formalities, police obtained a court order to restore the frozen funds, and Rs 2.9 crore was returned to the company’s account.
