If you or someone you know is a model that photographer they just friended on Facebook may not be who they think they know . Models in Bangalore just found this out , and the city's cyber police have yet to identify an internet predator who assumed a photographer's identity to stalk his model clients. The predator used the identity of photographer Anson Antony, to create fake Facebook, WhatsApp, Skype and Gmail account to contact models the Antony had worked with.
The Predator went as far as making one girl pose for him online and cancelling Antony's appointments, after he had sent friend requests to the models on Facebook and getting their cell phone numbers off of their profiles. He behaved so lewdly with them that the contacted the real Anson to see if he had been drunk at the time of the conversations.
15 Days ago the real Antony caught on to what had happened when one model inquired with him if he had gotten back in town, when the real photographer had never left for Malaysia as the model claimed he had told her. So Anson started checking with other models and was soon told by one that she had just done a test shoot with him.
Antony claims the imposter uses a number that he gave to the police to chat with models while claiming to be Anson. Antony went as far as to call the number himself and that's when the imposter told Antony he was doing it all to promote the photographer's work. Antony also said the number is switched off, unless the imposter is contacting his models on WhatsApp.
This is not the first incident Anson has encountered as another fake account was opened using his name six month ago, to foreshadow this debacle. After filing a complaint with the police, Facebook administrators were able to block the fake account. With the current incident he filed a First Information Report with the police in Banaswadi, but it yielded no results.
Police Commissioner Pronab Mohanty confirmed that cybercrime is taking an alarming rise their that find them unprepared and unequipped to deal with the increasing threat and warning that if someone discovers their identity has been faked to bring it to the attention of your friends that they have contacted and make sure they do not chat or friend the unknown person even in an attempt to catch the culprit.
