The Economic Offences Wing (EOW), Bhubaneswar busted a racket involved in duping crores of rupees from people through fake courier services and blackmailing victims in the name of Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), CBI, Police, ED.
The cyber-financial fraud came to light after Ratna Tripathy of Nayapalli area Bhubaneswar lodged a complaint in this regard. The victim alleged that she received a phone call on June 19 where the caller introduced himself as an employee of FedEx, Hyderabad. He told her that a parcel containing six Passports, one Laptop, five ATM Cards, and 150 grams of Narcotics drugs sent to her has been intercepted by NCB Mumbai officials.
Though the victim denied sending or ordering any parcel, the caller asked her to come to the Narcotic Bureau Cell, Mumbai to clarify her point. The caller also threatened that if she cannot attend physically, she can connect to Mr. Gill of Narcotic Bureau, Mumbai over Skype. He further threatened her that she would be prosecuted under various charges including narcotics case and money laundering if she fails to do so.
The complainant later connected with a person who introduced himself as Mr. Gill, Head of the Narcotic Bureau Cell, Mumbai. He told her that a case of money laundering, narcotics smuggling, and violation of Crypto norms has been filed against her due to the illegal transactions through her Bank accounts. She was also told that she has links with Gangster Islam Malik.
What Happened Next
The second person on Skype threatened the victim that if she wants to prove her innocence, she has to send an amount of around Rs 1.5 lakh to one account number of FDRBI of RBI for verification. She was assured that if nothing illegal/suspicious is found with her bank transactions, the amount will be immediately returned within 15 minutes.
Out of panic, she sent the amount from her bank accounts through UPI and IMPS. During the conversation for next 10 to 15 minutes, she was given the clean chit but the caller went offline, and her money was never returned as assured.
EOW Findings
It is a huge fraud using the name of courier companies and faking as NCB, CBI, ED, Police officers. Hundreds of people across the country are being threatened and extorted huge amounts of money by scammers. The scammers don’t show their faces in the video chat. They use fake identity cards/ certificates which makes victims believe them to be genuine.
Follow-Up Action By EOW
It was found that the amount deposited by the victim landed in a mule account of one Jagdamba Enterprises in Punjab. It was also found that in just 2-3 days, the scammers had extorted Rs 5.58 crore from several people across the country using this single account. The money was subsequently transferred to different mule accounts and ultimately a major chunk was withdrawn through an ATM in Dubai, UAE.
During the investigation, EOW has frozen 17 bank accounts involved in this fraud. Further steps are being taken to ascertain identify the mastermind of this scam and the fraudsters sitting in Dubai.