Embassy of India Tokyo - Advisory to the Indian Community on Fraud Phone Calls
The Embassy of India, Tokyo would like to draw the attention of the Indian Community in Japan about fraudulent calls being received by members of the community, especially Indian students and professionals, from unscrupulous elements using the name of the Indian Embassy and spoofed telephone numbers. The callers generally speak English or Hindi.
The method adopted by the criminals is often as follows:
- Calls originate from many numbers, including 0332622391. While this is the registered Embassy number, these callers have been able to spoof this number. Sometimes calls have no caller ID i.e. show no number.
- Most often, the fraudsters claim that the call recipient has provided wrong or incomplete information to the Japanese authorities (or the Indian Embassy) and that if they do not transfer ‘penalty’ money immediately, they would either be sent back to India or be sent to jail. They are in possession of personal details (usually through open sources like social media platforms), which lends authenticity to their claims.
- In some cases, they have now begun to ask for money so that their names could be included for consideration in the Vande Bharat Mission flights being organized by the Government of India.
The perpetrators aim to and are able to cause panic and urgency, and demand that the fine or penalty needs to be paid through Western Union money transfer/purchase Ideportation proceedings would be initiated.