Cyber crime on the rise in Shillong

FROM A REPORTER

SHILLONG, June 7: The Superintendent of Police East Khasi Hills District M. Kharkrang urged people of the state to be careful when it comes to cyber-crime in wake of the increasing cases where people are being duped worth lakhs especially through social networking website ‘Facebook’.

According to police statistics, 72 cases of cyber-crimes were reported in the year 2014, 47 cases in 2015 and 14 cases this year till April. Speaking to The Sentinel, Kharkrang said, “People have not taken the advisory on cyber-crime issued by police on a regular basis seriously and in many such case the victims of cyber-crime when they come to us (police) they will always say that went through the advisory but didn’t expect to get duped.” He said that the common cases are when someone calls informing that they have won a lottery worth lakhs and later asked to send back some money to avail the prize and in some other cases people are also duped when unknown caller pretending to be bank employee asks them for ATM number details citing that their ATM needs to be changed.

“If I won a lottery then why do I have to pay to get it? The logical thing is to deduct whatever requirement is need from the prize money but people still believe that they have to pay a certain amount,” he said adding that people should apply common sense to avoid being duped or contact the police if they do come across such situations. On cyber-crime cases relating to ‘Facebook’ he said, when it comes to social networking websites the first thing is chatting and after months of texting with a particular person they tend to get intimate with that person and feel that they have known that person for a long time and then they start believing in that person, however the fraudster will ultimately take that opportunity to dupe the other person who has been chatting with him.

He informed that in few cases the police have maged to recover the amount of money the victim had been duped and arrest in this regard have also been made. “Our team had also gone to Delhi and we have arrested some foreigner and Indians including people from Jharkhand involved in duping people from the state,” he said. To tackle the growing cases of cyber-crime the police earlier this year on April, 2016 introduced the Cyber-Crime police station at police headquarter in the city.

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