SRINAGAR: A major scam involving financial fraud worth crores has surfed in the Kashmir Valley after investors alleged that they were duped of their hard earned money by some private company based in the Valley.

According to details available with the news agency, Kashmir News Observer (KNO) some investors today held a protest in Srinagar alleging that they were duped by a private investment firm of their hard earned money.

“We were lured to invest money in the company stating that the money you invest will get doubled within 15 days. This prompted us to invest money in the firm and in the first few months they received the money as promised, however, after sometime they didn’t get any response from the firm, which created doubt in their minds,” said one of the protestors.

She said that she along with her other family members invested around Rs 5 lakh in the firm and they were motivated by a social media influencer after he had posted some videos on his YouTube channel, claiming the the firm was authentic and he himself has invested his money in the same firm.

“A few days ago we tried to contact the firm and its employees, but we have not been getting any response. We have now been duped of our hard earned money. This company is fraud as it cheated many people here and duped them of crores,” she added.

Meanwhile, local employees who were working in the firm and were directly dealing with the customers or investors claimed that they have themselves been duped of their money as were not aware of firm’s credentials. 

“We would be asked by administrators of the firm, who are based in Chennai and would sometimes stay in Srinagar also, to ask customers and investors to invest their money based on some plans and their money would be doubled in 15 days,” said one of the employees of the firm.

He said that initially the doubled amount was credited in the bank accounts of customers or investors and they themselves (employees) also started to invest their salaries in the firm, however, they have also been duped of the money as well as of their employment. 

A senior officer of Cyber Police Kashmir told KNO that they have received some complaints against the firm and they taken cognisance of the same. “We are further investigating the matter and those involved will be bright to justice,” he said.(KNO)

SRINAGAR: Criminals have found an innovative method to loot money from naïve people by using computer-generated voice sounds of victims’ friends and relatives. All this they are doing with the help of Artificial Intelligence based applications.

Jammu Kashmir Police in this regard have issued an advisory asking people to stay alert.

“The Artificial Intelligence-based voice cloning is the new cyber crime in news. Apple Ios7 and various apps and sites like Heyge, Murf and Resemble Al etc. are being used for voice cloning,” police in advisory has noted.

The advisory reads that the criminals are using computer generated voice sound to act as friends and relatives and in the process, money can be lost.

Sharing the modus operandi, police said that the Ai-ml (artificial intelligence/ machine learning) model learns the patterns and characteristics from the person’s voice recordings. (speech patterns, accents, voice inflection and even breathing).

Police stated that learning includes pronunciation of words, tone of the voice and emotions. Now criminals use this Al-ml model to convert text to speech as it generates a waveform to represent the sound of any person.”“

The computer-generated call is then used by the criminal to call his/her relatives or friends and based upon the familiarity of the voice, the victim ends up paying the money,” he said.

Police however, spreading awareness on the concern said that the receiver must listen carefully to unnatural pause or robotic speech styles, look for errors in pronunciation or speaking tone.

“The voice can be compared with the original person and notice if the voice lacks emotional expression or difference.” 

“The receiver must always try to call the original person with the saved number to recheck, adding, “the voice sample or recordings shall not be shared to an unknown person while limiting access to sensitive voice recordings or audio files.” (KNT)

Pulwama, 8-Apr,CNS; Burglars looted an ATM machine in Pulwama and decamped with more than 24 lakh rupees.

As per official reports to CNS, unknown miscreants looted an Automatic Teller Machine (ATM) of a Jammu and Kashmir bank in south Kashmir's Pulwama during the intervening night of Friday and Saturday at Boys Degree college Pulwama with the exact cash of more than 24 lakhs in the ATM.

Meanwhile, police have registered a case and launched a massive hunt to trace the machine. (CNS)