Port Blair, Aug 24: There are reports of online fraudsters having become active in cheating the public of their money. In most of the complaints received by A&N Police, the victims are bank account holders who fell into the trap of the cheats. The cheats made phone calls posing themselves as bank officials and the victims shared their ATM Card No. and PIN with these fraudsters only to realise that the caller was a fake bank official and has withdrawn money from their accounts.
Recently large number FIRs have been registered in PS Aberdeen, PS Pahargaon & PS Chatham on the complaints of the cheated public and investigation is in progress.
The fraudsters are adopting several modus operandi. One is to first make a call to anybody’s mobile and introducing himself as Manager or ATM official of a reputed bank and asking for the person’s ATM card no. and PIN. It is to be noted that Banks never ask any such information from their customers through phone or email. But those people who do not pay attention to these advisories issued by the banks, fall prey to the fraud callers. On revealing the info, the caller asks the victim to switch off the mobile for some time so that a new PIN would be received. On switching it on after some time, the victim finds that money has been withdrawn from his or her account. The fraud caller is not traceable thereafter.
Some time, the fraudster would use several tactics to know the customer’s PIN such as by first giving a number and asking the customer to subtract that from his PIN and then tell him the final value. The cheat can then easily calculate the PIN and withdraw money.
In certain cases, the complainants have taken part in TV game shows and they received calls from some number saying that they have won the game. The prize money or vehicle would be given to them after the customer deposits a certain amount in a bank account no, the caller tells. Allured by this, the victim deposits the money after which the caller becomes untraceable.
Similarly, people have fallen victim to allurement through phone calls, SMS, emails wherein the recipient is told to deposit some money in order to receive some ‘prize’ ‘lottery’ or ‘cash reward’. The recipients are asked to forward their names, addresses and photographs etc. to an email id specified in the SMS and then to deposit cash in some specified Bank account number. The victim is trapped in a phased manner over a period of time and before he comes to realize that he has lost his hard earned money to the fraudsters, the culprits are untraceable and the money not recoverable.
The first and foremost action expected of the receiver is to delete such a message as soon as it arrives in the inbox. Such cybercrimes are often difficult to be detected and culprits virtually remain untraceable. Public should remain alert to such fake calls for ATM nos. or PIN, alluring messages, e-mails or phone calls and not fall into such traps in order to protect themselves from being cheated.
In an advisory, Police has urged public not to disclose Bank ATM Card no. or PIN details to anyone. Banks never ask customers over phone or through e-mail or SMS for such details, not to respond to any e-mail seeking your personal details, bank account number, credit/debit card details etc, not to pay heed to alluring messages like “You have won prizes, lotteries & cash rewards”… etc. Further sometime, the sender of the message want you to call a particular number like WINNER! 9495504389 is chosen for $ 2500 CASH prize, call +43820956174 now”. If this number is called, huge amount gets deducted from the balance in the mobile connection.Instance of subscribes receiving missed calls from suspicious looking numbers starting from +375, +22455 or a few digits and those who tried to call back on these numbers were charged a whopping Rs. 45 per minute and people should not call back to such numbers, a release from the District Superintendent of Police says.

Port Blair, July 3: The Police has found a male dead body identified as Shaik Mehbood, S/o Late Shaik Kasim, aged about 65 years, private worker at Haddo Gate No. 4 near the Parking Shed and an UDFIR under section 174 Cr.PC has been registered as PS Chatham. Since, no relative has come forward to claim the dead body, the body has been kept in the cold mortuary of GB Pant Hospital after the PME for further disposal. As per the descriptive rolls, the deceased is 5ft 5 inch in height, Colour-Shallow, Hair-Light Gray, Built-Thin and wearing light blue color towel. The general public has been requested to pass on information, if any, about the relatives of the deceased or for claims over the dead body to Police Control Room over phone number 100.

Port Blair, June 10: An FIR under section 377 has been registered against one minor boy of Brichgunj area of South Andaman for involving in ‘unnatural sex’ with another minor boy.
According to reports both the boys of Class VIII and Class V were spotted by another village boy at Brichgunj Jungle following which parents of the Class V boy registered an FIR against the Class VIII boy, following which a case under section 377 was registered at PS Pahargaon.

Sarthak Kanjilal
Havelock, June 09: The Forest Department of Havelock has seized huge quantity of Jungli Post, Jungli Balli and some Khadi Mahuwa pieces from a creek at Havelock today.
According to reports, the forest department received a complaint from the villagers about sighting of a Crocodile at Havelock and because of which since last 3-4 days the staffs of the forest department were continuously patrolling in the area.
However while patrolling the staffs of the forest department with the help of Binocular sighted Jungli Post, Jungli Balli and Khadi Mahuwa floating in the creek.
“These timbers are floating in the area since nearly last one year but due to the strong vigilance of our staffs the smugglers couldn’t manage to take away these timbers,” Deputy Forest Officer Mr. Dsouza said.
Further Mr Dsouza also added that the department is now investigating into the matter and trying to trace out the smugglers.