Are You Safe? Even A Techie Lost 82 Lakhs In a 700 Cr Racket Busted by Police!!!

The Hyderabad Police has busted a massive fraud ring involving Chinese handlers that cheated at least 15,000 Indians of over ₹ 700 crore in less than a year. The police said the money was transferred to China via Dubai and some of it was also sent to an account linked to the Lebanon-based terror group Hezbollah.

According to Hyderabad Police Commissioner CV Anand, the police are alerting Central agencies about this case and the cyber-crime unit of the Union home ministry has been given the details. He said it was shocking and surprising that even highly paid software professionals had fallen prey to this scam and lost as much as ₹ 82 lakh.

He also said the police suspect that a part of the money was converted into cryptocurrency and deposited into a wallet operated by Hezbollah. Nine people have been arrested so far - four from Hyderabad, three from Mumbai and two from Ahmedabad - and the police are searching for at least six more.

The cyber-crime branch of the Hyderabad police, which started investigating the case in April after receiving a complaint from a person who said he had been conned of ₹ 28 lakh, found that people were lured in the name of investment-cum-part-time-jobs. They were asked to do simple tasks, such as liking YouTube videos or writing Google reviews, and were paid for completing them.

The victims, who have lost ₹ 5-6 lakh on average, were contacted on Telegram and Whatsapp. They invested small amounts of up to ₹ 5,000 and were given high returns, including double the money in some cases, after finishing the first task. The investors were then asked to invest higher amounts in a series of 7-8 transactions.

A fake window showed the money supposedly earned by the investors, but they were not allowed to withdraw the money till they completed all the tasks. By then, they had already invested several lakhs of rupees.

A cyber fraud case involving ₹ 712 crore came to light after a victim named Shiva lodged a complaint with the Hyderabad cyber crime branch in April. He had lost ₹ 28 lakh to the fraudsters, who had set up 48 bank accounts in the name of fake companies. The police later discovered that another 113 bank accounts were used to siphon off ₹ 128 crore more from other victims.

The fraudsters transferred the money to various accounts and converted it into cryptocurrency. They then sent it to China via Dubai. 

"The accounts were opened in India using Indian SIM cards, but they were operated from Dubai. The fraudsters were in contact with Chinese operators, who orchestrated the scam," a police officer said.

One of the accounts belonged to Radhika Marketing Company, based in Hyderabad. It was linked to a phone number of Munawar, also from Hyderabad. He had travelled to Lucknow with three associates - Arul Das, Shah Sumair and Sameer Khan - and opened 65 accounts of 33 fake companies. They received ₹ 2 lakh for each account. The police arrested them after tracking down Munawar.

The police have arrested 11 people in connection with a scam involving Chinese apps that offered instant loans and then harassed borrowers for repayment. The scam was orchestrated by a network of Chinese and Indian nationals who used fake identities and shell companies to operate the apps.

According to the police, the accused opened 65 bank accounts using forged documents and fake names. They then linked these accounts to the apps and collected money from the borrowers. During their interrogation, they told the police that the accounts were opened on the direction of three other people involved in the scam, whom they have only identified as Manish, Vikas and Rajesh. The police are on the lookout for these three men. 

The 65 accounts were then used by the Chinese masterminds - Kevin Jun, Lee Lou Langzhou and Shasha - to move over ₹ 128 crore. 

Details of the transactions revealed that some of the accounts were being operated by a Dubai-based group using remote-access apps. The people in the Dubai group had connections with the Chinese network and were transferring money into crypto wallets. 

Some of the wallets used for this were owned by Ahmedabad-based Prakash Mulchandbhai Prajapati and Kumar Prajapati, both of whom have now been arrested. A police officer said Prakash used to speak to the Chinese handlers and shared the bank account details and other information with them. 

The officer said three people have also been arrested from Mumbai and they have information about at least six people based in Dubai who were involved in the scam.