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Verified By BOOM | 114

KYC Scams: Is Your Bank Account At Risk?

September 06, 2024 • Estimated Reading Time: 6 minutes

Browser View | September 07, 2024 | Subscribe

Hello,

KYC scams continue to cause significant financial damage. RBI data reveals that in 2021-22, there were 9,053 reported cases of fraud in banking operations in India. One particularly dangerous variant of these scams involves an APK (Android Package Kit) file attached to the message, which, when opened, could compromise the user's device. Read on!

While many of you might be familiar with Google Maps & Google Earth for navigation and geolocating visuals, there is a version of Google Earth which is even more helpful: Google Earth Pro.

This is a free desktop tool and can be easily downloaded on your devices. One of the most useful features of this tool over Google Earth (browser version) is: historical images.

It’s particularly helpful in fact-checking and verification as it tells you how a particular place looked over a period of time.
You can basically do a ‘before’ and ‘after’ comparison of any location, provided there is enough data in the repository.
Step 1: Download Google Earth Pro by clicking here.

Step 2: Open Google Earth Pro > Find a location > Click View > Historical Imagery or, above the 3D viewer, click Time.
Step 3: You can toggle the timeline and change the date range as required.

KYC Scams Are Zooming: How Fraudsters Hijack Bank Accounts

🔖 A few months ago, Maroof Lone, a student from Sopore in Kashmir, received a suspicious call. The caller, claiming to be an official from Lone’s Jammu and Kashmir bank branch, warned him that he needed to complete a KYC process immediately or risk losing his scholarship funds.

Red flags:

From the outset, Lone sensed something suspicious. “The caller’s tone was very casual, and the number didn’t look official,” he recalled.
Trusting his instincts, he decided not to fall for the trap. Yet, what unnerved him most was the amount of personal information the caller knew. “The caller knew my name, my father’s name, our residential address, and even bank details like the IFSC code,” he told Decode’s Hera Rizwan.

Usual tricks: In one tragic case in Kolkata, an 83-year-old retired government official lost his life savings of Rs 2.5 lakh after a scammer posing as a bank representative convinced him to update his KYC over the phone.

Misinfo Report: False Claims on Bangladesh, Kolkata Case Dominate August

🔖 On Top: In August, false narratives around the political unrest in Bangladesh and the RG Kar Medical College rape-murder case were prominent topics of disinformation.

The Lie Count: These two categories accounted for 41.3% and 14.7% of the 109 fact-checks published in English, Hindi, and Bangla.

Medium of Deception: 67% of the 119 fact-checks were shared via videos, followed by images (19.3%) and texts (13.8%).

🚫 Fake News You Almost Fell For

🔍 The Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) Haryana unit posted a cropped video of Deepender Hooda and falsely claimed that the Congress leader also acknowledged BJP's 'Nonstop Haryana' poll slogan. Read 🔗 Anmol Alphonso’s ↗️ fact-check.

🔍 Social media was rife with claims that creators of the recently released mini-series "IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack" changed the names of the hijackers who hijacked the Indian Airlines Flight 814 in December, 1999, to "Shankar" and "Bhola". How true is the claim? Find out in 🔗 Archis Chowdhury’s ↗️ fact-check.

🔍 An old video of three children removing nuts and bolts from a railway track in Karachi, Pakistan, was shared on social media with the false and communal claim that it shows Muslim children in India vandalising railway tracks. 🔗 Rohit Kumar ↗️ debunked the claim.

🅱️ Recommends

📖 This week's recommendation is: Teens are making thousands by debating Trump vs. Harris on TikTok

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