The Delhi police arrested nine men for operating an inter-State racket which sent victims phishing links claiming to give cash redeeming points in order to gain access to their bank details.
The matter came to light after an Army official filed a complaint on July 11, stating that he had received a text message from ‘AX-NEVADA’ claiming he could redeem 8,500 points in his bank account.
Mistaking the message to be from his bank, the complainant clicked on the link and logged into his account, after which he received an OTP that he fed into the system, said police, adding that ₹3 lakhs were removed from his account immediately after.
The police, after lodging a case, analysed the money trail and arrested Sanjay Kumbhkar from Madhya Pradesh.
“The money trail showed that the fraudster used Drive Track Plus (DTC) cards, used for purchasing fuel at petrol pumps, to move the cash,” an officer said.
After sustained interrogation, the accused revealed the names of seven others, and said that members of the gang would send phishing links via text messages and Telegram groups, while some would make DTP cards by using random persons’ Aadhaar card details, police said.
Subsequently, police teams arrested Sachin Pathak from Sehore in Madhya Pradesh, Kanta Prasad from Biaora in M.P., Mukesh Dangi from Raigarh in M.P.; Santosh Kumar from Bihar’s Samastipur, Arun Kumar Mandal, Narayan Kumar Mandal and Rajesh Kumar Mandal from Jharkhand’s Giridih, and Anand Mondal from Jamtara in Jharkhand.