We all have received those phony, fictitious mails claiming that Reserve Bank of India (RBI) will give you a lottery and tons of money, if you send a ‘processing fee’ to a particular bank account.
Although several among us will laugh it off, and delete that spam, there are several who fall in the trap, and end up losing their hard earned money.
RBI has decided that enough is enough.
They have just launched a massive campaign against this scam, and have announced a toll free number which can be used to report such SMSes and emails, and help RBI to stop this menace.
RBI Lottery? Give A Call At 8691960000 Now!
In their campaign note, SBI has cautioned public in general against this scam. They have asked people to give a missed call at 8691960000 to report the incident, and to get more guidance as to how to report such cases to cyber police.
In their advisory note, RBI has said,
“Don’t pay fees or charges to get large sums in return. RBI/RBI Governor/Government never sends such email/SMS/call,”
RBI have been issuing circulars cautioning against such frauds since long, but now, they have decided to unleash a massive SMS based campaign to create more awareness.
The SMS from RBI will include the toll free number to report such scams, and to get more information on how to tackle this.
People Are Losing Money In This Fraud!
These scamsters often use RBI Governor’s image, and create a document which clones an official RBI letter or any other Govt. department’s communication format.
Typically, such emails or Whatsapp forwards will say that the person has won crores of lottery from RBI, and in order to claim this money, they will need to send a payment processing fee in order to avail the lottery or any ‘surprise money’.
Recently, a person was sent a similar email, wherein he was promised Rs 5 crore by depositing Rs 9500 to a bank account, which was claimed to be “fund release order fee charges” for acquiring Rs 5 crore as “funds recovered from the erstwhile British rulers”.
These scam emails will have the photo of RBI Governor, and the amount will be always mentioned in USD or Euro, to instill more trust.
RBI has also asked all to report such cases at sachet.rbi.org.in, which is a specially designed site for solving such scams.
Stay alert, stay safe!