Live
- Sandard Glass raises Rs40 cr in pre-IPO deal
- Options data flags rising volatility
- Contrarians in sight amid low volumes-led pull back rally
- ‘Ksheera Sagara Madhanam’ enthrals audience
- Nifty back below 200EMA/ 200DMAs
- US Navy shoots down own jets over Red Sea
- Nara Devansh sets world record in chess
- Team India cross their fingers
- 3 energy efficient projects to reduce power bills in AP
- Governor Jishnu Dev Varma to Attend ABVP 43rd State Conference in Siddipet Today
Fraudsters using FB, WhatsApp to dupe users in investment scams in India: Report
Cybersecurity researchers have revealed the alarming rise of investment scams in India peddled through social media messaging platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Telegram, X
New Delhi: Cybersecurity researchers have revealed the alarming rise of investment scams in India peddled through social media messaging platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Telegram, X, and others, in which fraudsters convince users to invest in crypto, stocks by promising assured returns, a new report showed on Tuesday.
Since the beginning of 2024, the threat intelligence firm CloudSEK has identified a massive volume of malicious content on social media and messaging platforms.
The findings revealed over 29,000 malicious investment advertisements on Facebook along with a staggering 81,000 fake investment WhatsApp groups.
Additionally, the report highlighted the troubling tactic of impersonation, with 81,000 X accounts masquerading as known financial institutions to lend legitimacy to these scams.
"Scammers reach out to potential victims through various social media platforms, using compromised data to send direct messages. Once inside these groups, victims are manipulated into believing they are dealing with legitimate investment companies," the researchers explained.
"Scammers provide fake proof of earnings to deceive victims into investing. Promising high returns, they show fake profits to encourage further investments, then ultimately scam the victims and remove them from the WhatsApp group," they added.
According to the report, India, Malaysia, the US, Thailand, and Vietnam are the primary targets of these investment scams.
More than 1 lakh were reported investment scam cases in 2023 in India. In the first four months of 2024, Rs 1.2 billion in 4,599 cases were lost in digital fraud.
About 62,687 complaints of investment scams were registered in the first four months of this year and the losses from these scams were Rs 2.22 billion, the report said.
