He cites an example: One of the victims who reported the crime was added to a WhatsApp group, named ‘VIP 048’, by an unknown person. The victim noticed that people were earning high returns by investing through Binance, a crypto exchange. Later, the victim was sent a registration link, a user ID and other details to log in. The victim opened an account believing he was investing through Binance. This was a classic case of phishing, where fraudsters created a link and website that looked similar to the original Binance website, to capture the account details and other potential data of the user. Usually, the user realises later, sometimes after months, that there is no trace of the cryptocurrencies that he supposedly bought. Initially, the victim invested in 10 USDT and saw it doubling in a single day. “Later they lured the victim to invest in 1,000 USDT, and then more. Though the units increased on screen, withdrawal was not allowed. In this case, the victim lost a total of Rs 1.85 lakh. Another victim lost an amount of Rs 80 lakh in the same manner,” Anand adds.