Message, video call, blackmail: Modus operandi of a new phishing crime wave

It all started with a seemingly innocuous friend request on Instagram. Soon, there would be a video call, followed by a spiral of events that made Rohan Bhasin, 33, Assistant Vice President of a Delhi-based social media marketing firm, the target of a highly sophisticated cyber fraud.

While Bhasin was lucky not to lose money to the scam, police say such phishing attacks are becoming increasingly common, the handiwork of an alleged gang of scamsters who operate at the tri-junction of Haryana, UP and Rajasthan from places such as Bharatpur, Mathura and Mewat. While there is no consolidated data on the number of such attacks, police say their increasing frequency has earned the region the notoriety of being the