With people already wary of lottery scandals, are scamsters turning to SIM card cloning? Airtel users received messages on Sunday from what seemed to be the service provider asking customers to switch off their mobile phones for a few hours to avoid “fake calls”. There was a fear among customers that it was a ploy by scamsters to clone the SIMs when the phones are switched off.
Airtel sent an alert: “Any calls claiming to be made from Airtel asking you to switch off your mobile for a few hours is fraudulent. Airtel is not making such calls. Calls and SMSs announcing winning lottery prizes and any missed calls from unknown numbers with prefix other than +91 may be fake.”
A senior police officer said when a scamster picks up the target account as well the phone number, he has to compel the account holder to either lose or switch off his phone. “This is to avoid messages from banks reaching the original SIMs. Technically, a cloned SIM cannot be activated until the original is deactivated. It is also used to elude customers getting any alert messages about the transaction from the bank. It is surprising why the service provider is sending general messages,’’ a senior police officer said.