A faceless group that goes about defrauding entrepreneurs under the guise of assisting them with loans has been exposed.

The Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment, which alerted business owners to the scam on Thursday, said the fraudsters were using the name and email claimed to be from the ministry to swindle people.

The Special Adviser on Media to the Permanent Secretary in the ministry, Mr. Babajide Iletogun, said the group was operating through a scheme tagged, “Federal Government 2017 empowerment loan for entrepreneurs (nationwide),” to defraud unsuspecting members of the public.

He said in a statement that the group used an electronic mail cloned with the name of the ministry to ask prospective applicants to pay certain amount to register or apply for the loan.

The statement, however, did not disclose the number of people that had fallen victim to the scam.

The statement read in part, “Our attention has again been drawn to the unscrupulous attempt by certain individuals who are bent on defrauding the unsuspecting public by inviting applications for loans for entrepreneurs.

“The faceless group has one Jude Indiana with a phone number 08039505131 serving as front with ministryoftradeandinvestment@gmail.com as its email address.

“We want to restate that the ministry does not have any of such programme and is not in any way connected with the advert.

“All relevant information about the ministry is available on the website www.fmiti.gov.ng. The general public is hereby advised to disregard the offer.”

The statement said the ministry had informed security agencies about the development and the masterminds of the scam were being tracked with a view to bringing them to book.