Sathaye principal’s email ID hacked from Malaysia

Kavita Rege, principal of Sathaye College, Vile Parle, has lodged a complaint with the cyber crime cell at Bandra Kurla Complex after her email ID was hacked into and used to send messages to her contacts.

Early morning on January 2, she received calls from friends and relatives asking about her travails in Malaysia. They had received messages from Rege’s email ID that she was stuck there and needed $2,000.

The email asked the contacts to send money to a particular account to help her. Rege received around 30 such calls. On January 3, she filed a compliant with the cyber crime cell at BKC.

According to a police officer, Rege is not the only victim of an apparent online scam. The officer said that instead of responding to such mails, people should enquire whether the mail is genuine.

“People wanted to know whether I was in trouble. After I realised that they had received a mail from my email ID, I sent a message to everyone on my mailing list to tell them that everything was okay and that I was still in India,” said Rege.

The day after she filed a complaint, the police called her and said that her email ID was hacked from Malaysia. “The police informed me that they had informed the company that ran the email service. They have reinstated my account and have informed me about the kind of precautions that I should take,” she said.

The cyber crime cell in BKC declined to give details of Rege’s case. “We have received a number of written complaints regarding cyber crime, and it’s difficult to talk about specific cases,” said an official.