Man seeks massage, squeezed out of Rs 22,000 in Chennai – Times of India

CHENNAI: He wanted a massage for his tired limbs and decided against it after hearing of the rate but was forced to pay Rs 22,000 to the caller who threatened to upload his morphed photos on the net.
Police said Anna Nagar resident Prabhakaran, 49, was on Wednesday checking for a good massage centre in his neighbourhood when he received a SMS on his phone with a contact number and attractive offers. Since the rate wasn’t mentioned, he decided to call the number and make inquiries. When the person on the other end told him he had to pay Rs 22,000 for a session of massage, Prabhakaran felt it was too expensive, said so and hung up.
Within a couple of minutes, he received a call on his mobile phone, claiming that his phone had been hacked and his personal photographs and those of his relatives taken. The man told him he would morph them it and upload them on the internet if he didn’t pay Rs22,000. A panicked Prabhakaran transferred the sum digitally, but when the caller demanded another Rs 8,000 he refused and lodged a complaint with the Anna Nagar cybercrime police.
Police with the help of the calls received on Prabhakaran’s mobile phone and transaction ID launched a hunt for the miscreant. “It is always a risk to respond to unnecessary links and messages received on mobile phones. Not all messages are genuine. With miscreants trying to fool victims with different tricks, we need to be cautious,” said an officer. “People should install proper spam filters in email accounts to stop receiving unsolicited messages.”