Deccan Chronicle carried report on suffering techie
Picture for representational purpose
Chennai: Two days after Deccan Chronicle carried a report on how an innocent woman software professional from Thane, near Mumbai, became a victim of a WhatsApp message claiming she was a fraudster, which was widely circulated among people in Chennai, the city police on Saturday suo motu decided to probe the case. “Exchange of information through any medium should be carried out in a responsible manner. Sending malicious messages along with photographs of unknown people is a highly irresponsible act. Our cyber crime cell is registering a case here,” Chennai city police commissioner S. George told this newspaper on Saturday.
Two Tamil newspapers, believing the alert, had carried a report about it with the photograph of the woman because the messages were even exchanged by police officers in the city.The city police commissioner on Saturday held a meeting with all levels of officers and warned them against sharing information which has not been verified. The ‘alert’ message claimed that the woman would visit homes saying she was a representative of a gas company who had come to check the connection. It added that she would use a chloroform-laced handkerchief to make you unconscious before escaping with gold and silver ornaments.
“We have a copy of the complaint submitted by her brother with the Thane police. We are now trying to find out from where the Tamil message and text started originating in Facebook and WhatsApp,” said Mr Abhash Kumar, additional commissioner of police (south).
This is not the first time fake messages are being circulated among WhatsApp groups. Last week, another message, which was doing the rounds was about a teenage girl in Pallavaram who killed her parents for her lover and put their bodies in acid. “A similar incident was detected by Vadodara police in the second week October there. Maybe that incident had ‘inspired’ the ‘Pallavaram tragedy’ message,” a police officer said.
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