KARACHI – An international ‘cyber-extortionists’ and financial terroristsgroup has strike in Pakistan financial hub Karachi, demanding extortionmoney in digital currency.
Threatening calls and forwarding messages through WhatsApp [a freeware andcross-platform messaging and Voice over IP service] while portrayingthemselves as members of international terrorist organization. The scammersdemand extortion money in Bitcoin [a crypto-currency worldwide paymentsystem].
It has been learned that Sindh Assembly’s lawmakers hailing from Hyderabad,Sajawal and Thatta areas have received threatening WhatsApp calls demandingextortion money in Bitcoin.
Sources privy to law enforcement agencies stated that all calls had beenmade from computer-generated numbers having tendency to change numericalvalues after every call. As the cyber-crime wing further probed the issue,it was unearthed that IPs of different countries were used to sendextortion messages.
Ostensibly, it seemed that calls had been made to lawmakers only but laterit was learnt that people from other segments of society including doctors,lawyers and businessman had also received similar threats. At present,price of one Bitcoin equals PKR11,32,850.