Cyber fraud: Two more held

KOCHI: The Kochi city police arrested two persons from Mumbai in connection with the internet fraud case in which `13.4 lakh was swindled from the online bank account  of Dr Shabeer Khan  of Lakeshore Hospital.
The Kochi police team which visited Mumbai as part of the investigation traced the duo, Rohit Rabinder Bhoole, of Thane, and Ashish Ashok Salvi, who had played an indirect role in the case.
According to the police, the two had withdrawn `31,000 from the Axis Bank account to which money was illegally transferred from the doctor’s bank account.
After withdrawing the money, they hid the ATM card and lodged a complaint with the police. The two were nabbed by the police after examining the footage from the CCTV placed inside the ATM centre. Upon interrogation, it was found that both had  several fake accounts with banks. Five out of the six bank accounts held in Mumbai to which money were transferred were fake, the investigation revealed.
The police team took assistance from the Mumbai police to produce both the arrested before the Judicial Magistrate in Mumbai and were brought to Kochi on Sunday for collecting further evidence. The accused will be presented before the Chief Judicial Magistrate on Monday. The police had earlier arrested second accused Hamid alias Mirza Jaffer and fourth accused Atta Ur Rehman. The arrests were made in Hyderabad by a team led by Circle Inspector B S Suneesh Babu.
“The secret operation was carried out on March 30 when first accused Muhammad Ali, 28, a native of Hyderabad, hacked the online bank account of the doctor gaining access to the unique customer ID and password. The second accused Hameed visited a Vodafone showroom at Cyberabad and procured a duplicate SIM card of the doctor using a fake passport obtained from Guwahati. On March 30, they activated the duplicate SIM which led to disconnection of the original SIM of the doctor,”  Suneesh Babu said.
“Later, using the duplicate SIM card, they accessed the pin number from the bank and transferred the money from the doctor’s account. The duplicate SIM blocks the alert messages which are sent by the bank when a customer makes a successful transaction,” he said.
`13.4 lakh was thus transferred to 22 bank accounts in nine states across the country. The money was then withdrawn through 90 ATM centres. The police are on the search for Muhammad  Ali, who is still absconding. The police also suspect that hacking was conducted with the assistance of a Nigerian national who is incarcerated for a similar cyber fraud in Pondicherry.