Margao: Aruna Fernandes from Velim just wanted to pay her gas bill. A stranger called on WhatsApp, sent her an app, and asked her to install it. She did. Within minutes, Rs 2.2 lakh was gone — drained from her account, her husband’s, and her son’s.She is not alone. A mobile “update” link, a “free” credit card, a promising Facebook investment ad, and other such fraudulent tricks have emptied a Goan family’s savings even before they knew what was happening. Fernandes lost the money on July 13, within minutes of installing the app the caller sent her.“The moment a caller asks you to install an app to pay a routine household bill, that is the red flag,” a senior police officer said. “Gas agencies, banks, govt offices — none of them will ever ask you to download a third-party application to make a payment.”In Shristhal, Canacona, Salujus Fernandes was sent a link on his phone on July 14, ostensibly to “update” it. The moment he clicked it, his phone froze and restarted on its own. When he next checked his Google Pay app, Rs 90,000 had already been debited from his SBI account through a UPI transaction he had never made, sent to an account in another state.Cyber cell officials say this pattern — a link that hijacks the device just long enough to authorise a transaction in the background — is becoming one of the more technically sophisticated frauds reported in the state, and one of the hardest for victims to explain even to themselves afterwards. “People keep asking us, ‘How did the money go without my OTP?’ The fact is, the malware doesn’t need to ask you, it reads the OTP from your own screen,” the officer said.Clim Fernandes of Padribhat, Quepem, was offered a free credit card over a phone call in March. A WhatsApp link followed, along with an APK file to install, and an instruction to share his mobile screen and upload copies of his documents. Trusting the caller, he complied. OTPs began generating on their own. By the time it was over, Rs 2.3 lakh had been siphoned out through his bank account and credit cards.Screen-sharing, cyber cell officials say, is now one of the few techniques most commonly exploited by fraudsters. “Once someone shares their screen, it’s a case of a victim unknowingly handing over the keys themselves,” the officer said.However, for Shameer Devagiri, a native of Haveri in Karnataka now residing in Marcel, Ponda, the fraud came as an investment advertisement he saw on Facebook that he responded to. Over several months between Jan 2025 and July 2026, he transferred a total of Rs 3.5 lakh through multiple online transactions, reassured each time that high returns were on their way. Then the accused simply stopped responding.Cyber cell police have repeatedly urged citizens not to share bank details, OTPs, or other confidential information with unknown callers, stressing that no genuine govt agency conducts business through phone or video calls demanding money.
