A Sub-Registrar office at Mangaluru taluk in Mini Vidhana Soudha, in Mangaluru.
| Photo Credit: MANJUNATH HS
More than a year since 10 persons from Mangaluru city lost amounts between ₹2000 and ₹1 lakh, a home maker from Puttur is the latest victim of fraud using Aadhar Enabled Payment System (AEPS).
The 42-year-old homemaker from Bannur in Puttur taluk lost ₹40,000 to fraudsters who made use of her fingerprints on the AEPS enabled device and withdrew amounts from her bank account.
In the complaint to Puttur Town Police on October 12, the victim said ₹10,000 was first withdrawn from her SBI account on October 6. Then, ₹10,000 each was again withdrawn on October 8, October 10 and October 11, respectively. Suspecting AEPS fraud, the victim called the National Cyber Crime Helpline 1930 to file a complaint.
The Puttur Town police registered the compliant for the offence under Section 318(4) of Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and under Section 66(D) of Information Technology Act. The Dakshina Kannada police said they were yet to find how fraudsters accessed the victim’s fingerprints.
Masking fingerprints
In October 2023, Mangaluru police arrested four persons from Bihar in connection with 10 complaints registered at the Cyber Economic and Narcotic Crime station. Then Stamps and Registration Department took steps to prevent fraudsters from accessing fingerprints on registered property documents.
Dakshina Kannada District Registrar Syed Noor Pasha said fingerprints on registered documents are totally masked when copies of the document are displayed on Kaveri Online Services portal. The department made it a point to make people disable Aadhaar biometric before giving fingerprints at the time of registration. “We have taken all measures to prevent fraudsters from accessing fingerprints from registered documents,” Mr. Pasha said.
Published – October 14, 2024 01:56 pm IST