Forex Trade scam: Fraudsters cheat of Rs. 17 lakh, one arrested

Hyderabad: Three fraudsters running a Forex Trade scam cheated a man to the tune of over Rs. 17 lakh. The Cyberabad cyber crime police station registered a case and arrested one of the accused, while the other two are absconding.

According to the police, K. Umakanth befriended Mina on Tinder. Later, they started chatting on WeChat. After a few months of their friendship, Mina suggested Mr. Umakanth invest in Forex trade and earn huge profits. She advised him to contact Mike from China, who had experience in investing in Forex.

Mr. Umakanth contacted Mike and started chatting with him on WeChat. Mike advised him to open an account with MetaTrader4 and asked him to deposit money into a Kotak Mahindra account in Jubilee Hills. The account was held in the name of Mohd. Irfan. Accordingly, he deposited Rs. 2,30,000. Mr. Umakanth's Forex Trade account initially showed good returns. Seeing this, he again deposited Rs. 15,20,000 in Irfan's account. However, when he went to withdraw his money from a trading account, he was told that he could not do so. When he inquired about the same he realised that he had been cheated. He tried to contact Mina and Mike but both did not respond.

The police found that Mina was befriending people on Tinder and advising them to invest in Forex Trade. She would then introduce them to Mike who would advise them to deposit money into the bank accounts furnished by another accused Rajesh Kumar. Once the money was paid, Mike would show profits in the fictitious Forex Trade account for a few days. The fraudsters would then exchange the money for bitcoin and transfer it to Mike's bank account.

The police arrested Rajesh Kumar on 15 July.