Belagavi Police have released an advisory on combating fake profiles on social media, after some fraudsters created a fake profile of Superintendent of Police Sanjiv Patil.
Unidentified men have created a profile of Deputy Commissioner of Police, Bengaluru West, using the photo of Dr. Patil, who served in that post before being transferred to Belagavi a few months ago.
The fake profile on Instagram has posted requests for money from friends and acquaintances. A friend alerted Dr. Patil and he reported it.
Dr. Patil has also appealed to the public not to entertain such requests. “I have already initiated legal action against this. The police are already looking into the matter and the miscreants will be apprehended soon. People have to be cautious and never end up paying so,’’ he said.
Later, he issued a set of instructions to the public about safety on social media and identity theft.
They are: Keep your identity safe on social media. Check your privacy settings. When setting up a social media account, make sure that you’ve adjusted the relevant privacy controls so that strangers won’t be able to view your personal details and posts. To do this, go to the Settings tab on Facebook. Then click on “Privacy” and “Who can see your future posts”. You can set this to “Friends” or “Friends, Except”, which gives you the option to exclude certain people from reading your posts.
Don’t include personal information in your user name or email address. Avoid including details in your user name or email address that could be used by fraudsters to piece together your identity. Don’t accept invitations from strangers. Don’t connect with strangers as this gives them access to information that they could use to commit fraud. Be careful about what you post.
Avoid sharing personal information, like your credit card number or holiday dates (you don’t want criminals to know when you won’t be at home). Change your passwords regularly and don’t keep the same password across several accounts.
Apart from these, there are specific and detailed instructions on tracing, reporting and combating fraudsters on every social media platform, he said.
Those who suffer financial loss, data breach or invasion of privacy can approach the Cyber Narcotics and Economic Offences Police Station in their area, the Superintendent of Police has said.
