Based on a complaint filed by a woman victim from Begumpet, a case was registered and two foreigners were arrested on Thursday.
Two foreigners, Allote Peter alias Chibuza of Ghana and Romance Joshua of Nigeria, were arrested for Instagram friendship fraud.
According to the police, Oscar Leone introduced himself as a doctor from the US, and the victim later chatted with him on Whatsapp.
They later became friends, and the accused informed her that he was sending her a package containing gold jewelry, electronic gadgets, and cash.
Later, another person called the victim introducing himself as an official from the Customs department of Delhi International Airport.
He collected an amount of Rs 2.2 lakh from the victim towards customs and various charges.
The Cyber Crime police discovered the accused in Delhi during the investigation and arrested them.
During questioning, they admitted to visiting Delhi on a student visa, creating fake profiles on Instagram and Facebook using photos of white people, and sending follow/friend requests to women.
Later, they chatted with mobile numbers beginning with +1 and +44, leading the victims to believe they were speaking with foreigners.
After gaining the victim women’s trust, they made friends with them and told them they were sending a gift as a token of their friendship.
They sent photos of gold jewelry, cellphones, laptop computers, cash, and other valuables.
Later, their associates called the victims, introduced themselves as Customs officials from the international airport in Delhi, and collected money from them in the name of customs duty, income tax, RBI charges, conversion charges, and so on.
The case was cracked under the supervision of KVM Prasad, ACP, Inspector Venkata Rami Reddy, SI Keetha Madhusudhana Rao, constables Satish, Bhaskar, Murali Krishna, and Kranthi Kumar.
The police appealed to the people to take care while accepting friend/follow requests from unidentified people.
