Bengaluru cyber police arrest woman for allegedly blackmailing eloped couples using fake identities
Bengaluru cyber police arrested a woman accused of blackmailing eloped couples through fake online identities, highlighting growing concerns over cybercrime, online fraud, and digital extortion cases.
Bengaluru, May 18: Bengaluru Cyber Crime Police arrested a woman named Muskaan Rani along with three accomplices for allegedly creating fake IDs and blackmailing couples who ran away to marry or those men secretly married the second one.
Police said that the accused allegedly used fake names like Shabana Hussein, Kritika Reddy and Jhanvi Reddy to call such couples who they thought were courting trouble with their family's approval and intimidated them into paying money or threatened to disclose details of the marriage to family members. In some cases it resulted in a divorce of couples, causing friction with family members.
According to investigators, Muskaan was operating from a private marriage consultancy in Bengaluru and has allegedly viewed records of couples who had been seeking discreet marriage help. The data included Aadhaar number, mobile numbers, residential addresses, marriage documents and family background information, police said.
Recently, a Bengaluru couple had complained to the cyber crime police about receiving continual emails and online messages issuing ultimatums if they did not pay ₹3 lakh. According to news agencies, the couple had run away and married against their families' wishes, and told police they were afraid their personal and marriage records would be leaked to relatives and members of the community.
On the basis of the complaint, cyber crime unit officials investigated several mobile numbers, dummy social media accounts and digital payment transactions linked to the accused also. They also contacted other couples who were affected by this and had found several instances.
In HSR Layout a raid, reportedly police seized laptops, multiple mobile phones, SIM cards; notebooks containing details of clients and digital records related to fake online personas.
Officers believe there may be more victims yet to speak out.
The accused has been booked under relevant sections of extortion, cheating and identity theft, criminal intimidation, impersonation and provisions the Information Technology Act.
Muskaan has been brought before a magistrate and remanded in judicial custody for the further probe.
