Ahmedabad, July 17 (SocialNews.XYZ) A cyber fraud network allegedly linked to 54 fraud cases involving more than Rs 2.86 crore across 18 states has been dismantled by the Cyber Centre of Excellence, with the arrest of three accused who police say operated fake companies, opened corporate bank accounts and supplied mule accounts to cyber criminals.
According to officials, investigators found that the accused had allegedly facilitated cyber frauds worth more than Rs 2.86 crore through a network of fake firms and mule bank accounts.
Police said three accused have been arrested in the case, while investigations into the wider interstate and international network are continuing.
The investigation found that the accused had allegedly created two fake business entities and established offices at Oxford Avenue on Ashram Road and Yamuna-2 Estate near CTM in Ahmedabad to operate the network.
"They identified details of 72 mule bank accounts, of which 22 accounts were linked to 54 acknowledgements registered on the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal (NCCRP)," the official said.
Officials noted the linked cyber frauds include an Internet Banking Deposit Scam involving Rs 93 lakh in Bihar, an Investment Fraud of Rs 70 lakh in Karnataka and a Digital Arrest fraud of Rs 38 lakh reported in Maharashtra.
Police alleged that one of the accused, Dikshit Patel, played a key role in the Maharashtra case and described him as the alleged "mastermind" behind the digital arrest fraud.
According to investigators, the accused had entered into a criminal conspiracy to establish two fake firms, through which they opened 12 corporate bank accounts in different banks.
Police alleged that they also procured around 60 mule bank account kits and SIM cards registered to those accounts before supplying them to fraudsters carrying out cybercrimes over the internet.
The accounts were allegedly used to receive proceeds of cyber fraud, transfer funds through multiple bank accounts, and withdraw the money, with the accused receiving commissions for each account while helping move the funds through different channels to cybercriminal networks.
"Three acknowledgements were registered in Gujarat. The remaining 50 mule accounts were identified before they could allegedly be used in cyber frauds," officials said.
The accused have been identified as Nikunjkumar Patel, Dikshit Patel, and Sumit Soni. All are residents of Ahmedabad.
Police alleged that Nikunjkumar Patel, along with Dikshit Patel and another absconding accused, created fake firms and opened corporate bank accounts, then handed them over to Dikshit Patel for financial gain.
Dikshit Patel is alleged to have registered companies in the names of Nikunjkumar Patel and the absconding accused, Govind Patel, obtained corporate bank account kits, and supplied them to Sumit Soni, earning around Rs eight lakh.
Sumit Soni is alleged to have received the bank account kits from Dikshit Patel and passed them on to another absconding accused, receiving around Rs one lakh in return.
Police said the two companies allegedly created solely for the operation were "Travelflux Private Limited and Travocrest Private Limited".
According to the investigation, the firms carried out no legitimate business and were used to open corporate bank accounts whose kits were supplied to the accused for financial gain.
"The fraudsters used a variety of methods, including Digital Arrest, Investment Fraud, UPI-related Fraud, Deposit Fraud, Trading Fraud, Job Scam, Phishing through APK files, Online Shopping fraud and Internet Banking Deposit Scam," they added.
Police alleged that victims were contacted through SMS, WhatsApp and Telegram using false identities and lured with promises of higher earnings.
They further alleged that the accused persuaded victims to download a file named "dotp.apk" to obtain one-time passwords and carried out fraudulent transactions, while payments were processed through "Leo Pay".
The investigation also uncovered what police described as a new modus operandi involving merchant identification (MID) accounts.
The accused allegedly worked with payment gateway approval agents to open MID accounts in the names of fake companies by paying large sums of money.
Investigators said 38 MID accounts were opened in this manner and configured so that if a cyber fraud acknowledgement was generated against a MID account, only that account would be affected while the details of the associated mule account would not appear in the acknowledgement, making detection more difficult.
Police said they seized six mobile phones, eight cheque books, 31 debit and credit cards and one laptop during the operation.
Source: IANS
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