Yet another day and yet another ‘Bengaluru Techie’ is conned into paying crores to scammers. This time the damages are Rs 8 Cr. I have started to feel increasingly skeptical about these reports in news media. Initially the amounts were believable. A few lakhs. Now individuals (who, without exception happen to be ‘techies’), are losing crores. One wonders when do alarm bells start ringing for certain people? Normally, alert banks will call you if they spot unusual activity in your account. Do these people live under a rock? By now DHL and TRAI scams are meme materials. You would assume that a ‘techie’ who has crores to lose has certain smarts, a certain social circle, and is part of at least a few Whatsapp Groups where such warning messages are shared.
None of these news articles recreate an accurate modus operandi that sounds convincing. I can understand that newspaper is costly real estate, but I don’t see any follow up articles in online media either. I am not even sure if these ‘victims’ are all techies. I think media is lazy and anyone they encounter in Bengaluru is, according to them, a techie.