Bengaluru: A Good Samaritan act turned out to be an abominable fraud when a man, pretending to help a 36-year-old private firm employee injured in a road accident, stole the latter’s iPhone and then used it to siphon off over Rs 3.5 lakh from his bank account.According to a complaint filed by Sachin Prasad, a resident of Yelahanka New Town, he met with an accident near Allalasandra in Yelahanka on June 19 while driving his car. “While I was driving, a pedestrian suddenly crossed my path. I instinctively swerved to save him, but lost control and rammed the car into the road divider,” he told TOI.The car’s airbags were deployed but Prasad sustained a fracture to one of his hands. Minutes later, a few passersby rushed to help him. “I remember that about four people came to help me while I was struggling to call an ambulance. One of them spoke to me and, noticing that I was finding it difficult to make the call, asked for my iPhone,” he said.Little did Prasad know that the helping hand would turn out to be a thief’s. The man moved a short distance away on the pretext of calling an ambulance. Meanwhile, more people gathered at the accident spot, and the man fled with the phone. “I kept telling people that someone had taken away my phone, but they were focused on helping me. I was rushed to a nearby hospital, where I was admitted,” Prasad said.After being discharged on June 24, Prasad obtained a replacement sim card and soon began receiving SMS alerts about unauthorised transactions from his bank account.The thief had removed the sim card from the iPhone and inserted it into an Android phone. He created a UPI ID and activated UPI Lite linked to Prasad’s Bank of Baroda account.Between June 20 and 25, he transferred Rs 3,51,600 to multiple bank accounts. Realising the cyberfraud, Prasad immediately blocked his bank account and reported the fraud to cyber helpline 1930.Later, he visited the bank and complained about the transactions. “The bank staff told me they were looking into the issue, but they haven’t given me any explanation about how they allowed someone to create a new UPI ID and transfer the funds. My number was linked to two bank accounts; one is with Bank of Baroda and another with ICICI Bank. The miscreant tried to siphon off money from the ICICI account too, but he was unable to do it,” Prasad said.“When one bank takes preventive measures such as double authentication soon after a new UPI ID is created, why don’t other banks also do the same?” he asked.A senior officer said a case has been registered at northeast cybercrime police station, and Rs 2 lakh has been frozen in the fraudster’s accounts.
