Card cloning: Retd civic employee falls prey, loses Rs 1.47L

A 60-year-old pensioner was duped of Rs 1.47 lakh by card cloning after an unidentified accused withdrew the cash in a series of transactions. When the pensioner enquired with his daughter, he immediately approached Bangur Nagar Police, who registered a case under relevant sections of the Information Technology Act.

The complainant, Moshe Donde, a retired civic employee, was an account holder at the Malad branch of nationalised bank, where his pension is deposited.

On August 23, when he was visiting Kurla's Nehru Nagar, he received a message from the bank that Rs 10,023 was deducted from my account, which was followed by another message mentioning deduction of Rs 5,023. Donde immediately called his daughter to inform her of these transactions and how was the money deducted when the ATM card was in his possession, she too had no answers. The next day, Donde was to leave for Ahmednagar for work, and postponed the bank visit to August 28, where the bank official updated his passbook.

While Donde heaved a sigh of relief, he was shocked to face the same fate on September 6, when he had gone to the Malad branch of the bank and was informed that his account was wiped clean of Rs 1.25 lakh and had no money left. The bank immediately began an internal probe and told Donde that his card was cloned, wherein a few people had been withdrawing money from Rajasthan and Faridabad.

After the confirmation, Donde approached Bangur Nagar police station and registered a complaint against unidentified persons who withdrew a total of Rs 1.47 lakh by cloning the card and booked them under relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code and Information Technology Act for cheating.

Police said, they have recorded the complainant's statement and have taken the bank records, however, they are yet to make the arrests and are investigating the matter further.