Personal data of 3400 women in Gujarat and 4 crore women in India leaked: Enter the girl's name in the female search engine and buy all the private details for Rs 400!

Shalini (name changed) received a call from an unknown number. The caller told her that one of your friends Neha (changed name) had given her your number. The person also confirmed Neha's number. She told Shalini that we have to meet at one place and your friend Neha is also coming. She has been trying to call you for a long time, but she is not listening. So she has given us this phone number of yours. You come to meet at this time and at this place. The caller had given Shalini's friend's name and number correctly, so Shalini did not feel anything to suspect despite the unknown call. Believing this to be genuine, she went to meet her and what happened to her after that changed her whole life. The caller was a fraud and he raped Shalini by calling her to an unknown place. This crime, which started with cyber crime, turned into a horrific physical crime. Another shocking thing was that Shalini's friend Neha did not know anything about this. She did not give Shalini's number to anyone. So the question is, where did the caller get Shalini's number from? Incidents like what happened to Shalini happen on a daily basis in our country. There was a worrying news in the month of July. More than 1 terabyte of sensitive data of Bank of Baroda customers was leaked and put on the dark web. It had data including customers' photos, KYC details, scanned copies of Aadhaar and PAN cards, and loan documents! But now Divya Bhaskar has found another shocking information. The personal data of about 40 million women in India is being openly sold on the dark web for just 500 to 600 dollars. This includes very sensitive details like women's names, addresses, email IDs and phone numbers. These details are likely to have been leaked from a well-known e-commerce clothing brand in the country. In this data, which has been sold online since July 16, the seller has also kept a sample. Most of the data in the sample is of young women from Delhi. While some are also of women from Madhya Pradesh. On this issue, Divya Bhaskar further investigated and found data of 3366 girls in Gujarat and 999 in Delhi. If this data comes into anyone's hands, then it can be a problem for 4 crore women. In today's 'Sunday Big Story', we talked about this data leak. Divya Bhaskar spoke to cyber security expert Bhowmik Merchant to get more information about how this data was leaked and how it can cause havoc. He also confirmed that such data is being sold. Bhoumikbhai, who has been working in the field of cyber security for the last twenty years, also shared many shocking incidents like Shalini described above. He has also worked as a cyber security expert with various agencies like the police department, crime branch and ATS (Anti-Terrorism Squad). The data that is being sold on the dark web is state-wise. Hackers are selling this data for about 500 to 600 dollars. Bhoumik Merchant said that we have mapped the data of 28 states, which are currently on the dark web. Out of them, we bought and validated the data of one state for 20 to 25 dollars. It had full details and valid numbers. We have cross-verified and according to our research, this is completely validated and genuine data. Data leak of e-commerce clothing brand Regarding which sector the data that has been leaked, he said that this leaked data belongs to a very big e-commerce clothing brand in India. We have also confirmed this by cross-verifying with some customers. A 'female search engine' is made from leaked data! But if someone buys this data, then what to do with it? About this, Bhowmikbhai says, "We have seen things where this data can be used like a female search engine. For example, if you know a woman's name, then a search on the search engine will show her any number related to her. It will also show the same number and address with the woman's name. The data of many women with the same name is visible. If you want to buy the data of any one of them, then there is a charge of 4 or 5 dollars (400 to 500 rupees) per data. This is how it is also misused. Some people also harass women online by buying this data and sending it via WhatsApp or SMS." Fashion brands, spas, cosmetic companies buy data Whenever such a new data comes for the first time, its price is higher, but as soon as it gets old, its price gradually starts to decrease because many copies of it are circulated in the market. There are also some sub-buyers who keep it for sale. About 90% of the customers who buy this data are cyber scammers. Scammers send fake promotions according to the choice of women. For example, get a cosmetic product worth Rs 2000 for just Rs 500. Women are attracted to it and click on the link and fall prey to scams. Fashion brands, spas, salons or cosmetic companies also buy this data. So that they can market through SMS or email. State-wise, the cost of this data is $ 40 to 80. Of these, the data of Delhi and metro cities is the most expensive. The data of Bengaluru, Karnataka is more expensive than that of Gujarat because there is a Tier-1 i.e. economically prosperous public. It is very easy for any company to sell its products to the women of Tier-1 cities. Selling to big distributors at a higher price Usually, in such cases, hackers target a brand's website or portal. For example, they target a female cosmetic or clothing brand with more than 90% of female customers. Hackers hack its portal and steal data and sell it to a major distributor on the dark web for $5,000 to $6,000, then the distributor breaks it into smaller parts and sells it to different buyers for $400 to $500. Scammers have their own SOP. They have the entire directory of all the scams related to women. They scam according to the directory and use the data. For example, if the scammers know that women are interested in buying cosmetics, they will promote that we will give you a cosmetics of this brand for Rs 500. So that the woman will be interested in it. When she clicks on the link, it will be known that it was a scam. Talking about the modus operandi of scammers, Bhoumikbhai says, "We come across many cases whose history scammers know. Scammers know the name, address, topic of interest. After which they call and verify all the information. So that the other person is convinced that yes, he really knows, so he is calling from a trusted company. On the basis of this trust, the other person makes a financial transaction or shares more of his information, which is misused. Love affair and cheating with a woman Generally, people think that if our data is leaked, what can be the maximum damage? But a case from Rajasthan is an eye-opener. A woman's mobile number was leaked. From which the scammers found her Instagram and Facebook ID. Then they sent a request from a fake verified account on Instagram. After that request, they chatted. Which later turned into a love affair. As the conversation progressed, the scammers told the woman, "I live in Russia and I am sending a surprise gift for you, so please accept it." After this, the woman received a fake call in the name of the customs department. The person who identified himself as a customs officer said that if someone has sent a gift from Russia for you and his customs duty is Rs 4-5 lakh, then you will have to pay that duty. At the same time, the scammer messaged him and told him to pay whatever customs duty I sent and take the gift. When I gave Rs 5 lakh to the fake customs, I got a call from the fake Reserve Bank! The woman was confident that all this was true, so after she paid the money, she came to know that she had been cheated. So she complained. Even after this, the fraud that was happening to her did not end. After that, she received a fake call in the name of an RBI (Reserve Bank of India) official and threatened that she had done such a big transaction. If it is more than your income, then now you will be subjected to an income tax raid. To avoid this, you should pay some fees to the RBI. So the panicked woman paid that money too. Thus, a total of 16 lakh rupees was cheated with the woman! Molestation of a woman participating in a marathon The entire data sheet of the female marathon was leaked on the dark web. It was bought by hackers and bought by scammers from her. The scammers called a woman and said that we were also with you in the marathon in which you participated, so the woman trusted her. The scammers told her that we have another event and there is a pre-launch, in which other people of the marathon are going to come, so you also come. When the woman went to that place, there were no female friends there, but some men were present. Who tried to molest this woman. Seven years ago, a complaint was lodged with the Ahmedabad Crime Branch. After this whole incident, the woman was so mentally broken that she had to go to a rehabilitation center and after a long treatment, she recovered. All these cases are due to data leakage. Understand the ways shown by Bhoomik Merchant to avoid data leakage with the help of the graphics below. If it is known that a crime is being committed, then a complaint can be lodged on 1930 and https://cybercrime.gov.in/. Here's how to check the list of scammers. Whether any of your data has been leaked or not, you can check by entering an email id on the web called https://haveibeenpwned.com/ to check how many places it has been leaked. A service is also provided to know whether the data has been leaked or not. It gives information about how much data is in the market. For example, if someone has shared an email ID and put it for sale on the dark web, then it gets an alert. There is an elite class in India and abroad. They buy threat Intel services.