Sextortion gang of 11 involved in cyber crimes also busted

Gurugram :  Cyber Police have arrested a person from Tamil Nadu identified as Jamil Bin Mohammad Iqbal, a resident of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia who used to buy SIM cards from India and sell them in Malaysia. The accused used these SIM cards to cheat people of India while sitting abroad. Addressing media persons, ACP Cyber Crime Gurugram Priyanshu Diwan said that their accused resident of Kuala Lumpur arrived  in India on Thursday, took more than 150 SIM cards and arrested by Gurugram police with his four accomplishes on December 19 when arrived at Tiruchirappalli airport to attend a marriage function and was detained by immigration officials.

 Information revealed that Iqbal’s mother is a Tamilian married to a woman from Tiruchirappalli. Gurugram police searching him, on the basis of an information in a case as regard Rs 1.81 crore cyber cheatings,  nabbed him and brought on a prisoner transit warrant and during search recovered from him his Malaysian passport, an international driving license, health card, a debit card, mobile phone and Indian and foreign currency. During preliminary interrogation Iqbal confessed that he used to buy Indian SIM cards which were sold to cyber racketeers in China Cambodia involved in cyber crimes.   Police said that the fraudsters sitting abroad used these SIMs to cheat the people of India. Investigation revealed that he had taken more than 150 SIMs to Malaysia in two trips so far. Two people who gave SIMs to the accused were arrested in August this year itself. When they were interrogated, information about Jamil was obtained. After this, the cyber police had issued a look-out circular. As soon as he landed at the airport, the airport police caught the accused and informed the Gurugram police.

 During a drive by Nuh police in Mewat, a gang of 11 cyber fraudsters was busted from whom police recovered 12 mobile phones and 15 SIM cards. Nuh in Haryana has emerged as the latest epicentre of cyber frauds in the country, and in a special drive police unearthed cyber frauds worth over Rs 100 crore involving more than 28,000 people across states and union territories. The Haryana Police claimed to have busted a major gang that used to cheat people across the country with fake SIMs, Aadhaar cards etc. and used to deposit money in fake bank accounts to avoid arrests. The fraudsters targeted people across Haryana, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh to Andaman Nicobar. Then Varun Singla, Superintendent of Police, Nuh said that a total of 102 teams of 5,000 policemen had raided 14 villages of the district simultaneously, when during raids around 125 suspected hackers were detained, of these 66 accused were identified and arrested and were produced in courts and taken in remand.

Past scenario reveals, Former DGP Haryana P.K. Aggarwal had deployed a team of 40 cyber experts from all across Haryana to be closely associated with the interrogation cybercriminals. The mobile phones and SIM cards seized during the raid were also technically examined and relevant details were also sought from TSPs/ISPs, Banks, NPCI, UPI intermediaries, UIDAI, DoT, and social media platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp, OLX, etc.when a total of 1,346 FIRs were registered against the fraudsters. The details of these cybercriminals were sent to senior police authorities of many states. The investigation also revealed information about 219 accounts of private and public sector banks and 140 UPI accounts which were being used for committing cyber frauds. These bank accounts were mainly found to be activated online and that too by defrauding people on the pretext of providing a job, attractive offers in share business, getting loans and facebook friendship by the females, preparing nude videos for blackmailing and taking their credentials such as Aadhar card, PAN card, mobile number and getting an online KYC done.

Information also reveals that apart from this, 347 SIM cards activated from Haryana, West Bengal, Assam, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, Delhi, Tamil Nadu, Punjab, North East, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka circles of telecom companies were being used by the cybercriminals functioning in Mewat. During the investigation, the source of fake SIMs and bank accounts were found to be mainly linked to district Bharatpur in Rajasthan. Past information also revealed that in 16 cases registered in Nuh district, 250 wanted cyber criminals in the age group of 18-35 were found working as co-accused to the cybercriminals apprehended, of which 20 are from Rajasthan, 19 from Uttar Pradesh and 211 from Haryana.

The cybercriminals usually duping victims through sextortion crime by creating attractive profiles on social media platforms and luring the victims to come on a video chat where they carry out screen recording of the victims in compromising position and then extort huge sums of money from them threatening to release nude prepared video on social media. The police are working on the multiple leads provided by the cybercriminals arrested and further raids are being carried out to nab the criminals spread over multiple states. Nuh Cyber Police Station has arrested a cunning thug who used to dupe people on social media in the name of a fake police and army officer. The accused has been identified as Mursaleem son of Hakimuddin a resident of Mohammadpur. A SIM card and mobile phone issued on a fake address have been recovered from the accused. Police spokesperson said that Mursaleem had created fake profiles on social media by hiding his real identity. In these profiles, he used the names and posts of police and army officers and used to call people and dupe them by threatening them. Based on the information, the Nuh Cyber Police Station team took action and arrested the accused and the SIM cards found from him were issued on fake addresses. A case has been registered against the accused under various sections.

Meanwhile, DGP Haryana Shatrujit Kapoor has appealed not to trust the call or social media message of any unknown person. Immediately inform the police about such cases. Strict action will be taken against such fraudsters.