Ola Electric Scooter Scam – 20 Arrested

The latest in the line of online scams is the Ola Electric Scooter scam. According to reports, more than 1,000 people have been duped through the Ola Electric Scooter Scam. Moreover, the scam was initiated through a fake website of Ola Electric, and the scam was exposed after an FIR was filed by one of the victims with the cyber crime police.

Diving into details, it has been revealed through the initial investigation that the scam was initiated by two individuals from Bangalore. These alleged scammers created a fake lookalike website of Ola Electric to dupe people who were looking to buy the Ola electric scooter.

Though the person who filed the FIR initially used the official Ola Electric application, he started browsing the internet as he could not find the finance option for the Ola electric scooter in the official Ola Electric application.

This is when the victim visited the fake Ola Electric website created by the two individuals from Bangalore. Upon entering the fake Ola Electric website, the victim was asked to enter his details like name, mobile number, and other details. Subsequently, the victim received a phone call on the given phone number and was asked to pay Rs 499 for booking the Ola Electric scooter.

Since the booking amount mentioned on the call was the same as on the official website, the victim assumed it to be genuine and paid the amount to the scammers via the PayU app. Within the next day, the victim also received an email that listed all the finance options.

From the fake list given, the victim chose to go with Ola Money, where the fake finance plan was laid out with a Rs 30,000 down payment and a loan amount of Rs 72,000. Also, the payment link for the down payment was generated and sent to the victim via WhatsApp.

Further assuming the process to be genuine, the victim paid the down payment. However, the scam didn't end there, the scammers asked the victim for an additional Rs 13,000 in delivery charges and promised to dispatch the electric scooter the same day.

While the victim paid Rs 13,000, things started looking suspicious and the victim quickly approached the cyber crime cell to register an FIR. Moreover, according to an estimation, more than 1,000 people could have been duped by these scammers.

However, thanks to quick action from the cyber crime department, the call centre run by the scammers were quickly traced and raided. During the raid, more than 60 mobile phones, 114 sim cards, and 7 laptops were seized. Additionally, police have also traced 25 bank accounts with transactions of more than Rs 5 crore.

However, we are yet to know if the victims will receive their money back from the scammers and 20 people have so far been held till further investigations are underway.

Thoughts About The Ola Scam

The Ola Scam yet again highlights the need to be cautious while doing online transactions. Moreover, it is always safer to do any transactions via the official website rather than relying on 3rd party services.