Beware of scammers!!

What I am going to type down below is a really story of how a friend of mine was duped. So read this to the end and be careful of such people I will describe now.

Some days ago while I was having lunch in my office cafeteria, I got a call on my cell. The caller said that he was my college senior and he was in Mumbai. His pocket had been picked and he had no money to return to Bangalore. He just had his ICICI debit card from his old salary account and wanted me to help him. He said that he had got my number from the college alumni website. Since he was in Mumbai, I gave him the phone number of a couple of my friends from college there and asked him to call them. I told him that they may be able to locate some of his batchmates from TCS there who would help him.

When I came down to my desk after lunch, I had a vague feeling that something was wrong. I checked out our alumni listing and found no name which he had given me. I then asked one of my friends in Bangalore if he knew any of our alumnus by that name. When he refused, I was certain that this guy was some kind of a "head hunter" who was looking for contacts in Mumbai. So I called one of my friends whose number I had given and told him the details. He said that if he got a call, he would see. But I made a mistake. I did not inform the second guy whose phone number I had given. That guy got a call from Mr. Senior who pleaded for help. Now this guy is real soft at heart, though he pretends to be otherwise, and transferred a thousand bucks into the account the caller provided. The caller in turn gave his e-mail id and phone number to my friend. Both of them turned out to be fake! My friend has been duped of a thousand bucks.

It seems to me that this is some new kind of a scam with a novel modus operandi. I'd suggest all people reading this to be very careful and not be taken in by such unscrupulous people calling. Spread the word and help preventing other people from being cheated.