Two cyber frauds held; cops find transactions of ₹60 crore in bank accounts

Two cyber frauds in Gujarat arrested for defrauding college students by luring them to like YouTube videos; transactions worth ₹60 crore found in bank records.

MUMBAI: Two cyber frauds were arrested on Friday from Gujarat for allegedly being involved in a racket defrauding college students of lakhs by luring them to like YouTube videos. Analysis of their bank records by the officials showed transactions worth ₹60 crore in the past three months.

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The arrested accused were identified as Rupesh Thakkar, 33, and Pankaj Od, 34, residents of Gandhinagar district of Gujarat. They were tracked during the investigation of a case registered by a 19-year-old student who was defrauded of ₹2.5 lakh in October this year after he took up a part-time job which involved liking YouTube videos.

The then-unknown crooks were booked under sections 419 (cheating by personation), 420 (cheating and dishonesty), 467 (forgery), 468 (forgery for the purpose of cheating) and 471 (using forged documents as genuine) of the Indian Penal Code.

“Through a technical investigation that involved tracing the accounts to which the complainant had made the payments, we figured out where the accused were stationed. With the help of Gujarat police, we nabbed them earlier this week,” said an officer from Matunga police.

From the two men, the police have also seized several bank documents including credit cards, debit cards and chequebooks as well as devices including six mobile phones and 28 SIM cards. They also found some rubber stamps that were used to authenticate forged documents shared with the victims of the accused.

“Analysis of their transaction history revealed that the two men have made transactions worth ₹60 crores in the last couple of months. However, the accounts that we could link to them only had ₹1.1 crore which we froze,” said the officer. He added that the rest of the money was already poured into other accounts which are also under the scanner.

Police believe that they could solve several other cases of cyber fraud through a thorough analysis of the accounts of the two accused. Both arrested accused are currently in police custody.