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Extravagant displays of wealth, verified instagram accounts and long lists of victims around the world.
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Nigerian Raymond Abbas aka Hushpuppi and Canadian Aziz Mirza aka Com Mirza have uncanny similarities.
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Hushpuppi was busted by Dubai Police in a $430 million cyber scam last fortnight. Around the same time Burj Khalifa resident Com Mirza was convicted by Dubai Court for a multi-million dollar fraud and sentenced to prison.
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Hushpuppi specialised in creating fake websites and hacking corporate accounts to direct huge payments to accounts controlled by him. Com Mirza, on the other hand, specialised in peddling get rich quick schemes.
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Until their seemingly enviable lives fell apart, they were looked up as role models.
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Currently in jail, both instagram influencers lived in Dubai, passed themselves off as successful businessmen, boasted about their meteoric rise from humble beginnings and flaunted their lavish lifestyle to attract followers and lure in potential victims from as far as the United States, UK, Canada and India.
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Gulf News rounds up some pictures from their Instagram posts to show their common love for designer clothes and luxury cars and expensive watches.
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Did you know? An Instagram account called @BallerBusters is calling out self identifying entrepreneurs who show off a fake, lavish lifestyle to sell young followers mentorship programmes or online classes
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Gulf News trawled their social media pages and found very similar pictures depicting the same aspirational lifestyle here in the emirate
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But this life was a lie. Straight from fast cars and private jets and helicopters
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To flashy watches like this one seen on the wrist of Con Mirza
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It makes you wonder whether you can seriously believe what you see on social media and whether you should be so trusting of people, particularly when investing in someone you thought was a legitimate businessman.
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