Three persons, including a Bhopal rapper, have been arrested in connection with an alleged online fraud of ₹1.17 crore, the police said on Saturday.
Sources said Tarun Chhipa, who has YouTube channel with 559 subscribers, has a dual personality. He is also part of a gang, which hacks into online accounts of people through their mobile numbers.
The other two accused have been identified as Salman Qureshi from Bhopal and Kalicharan from Hapur.
“This is the face of cybercriminals nowadays. They are educated. The accused are in the age group of 20-25,” said Additional Superintendent of Police Ram Arj.
The case came into fore in November, 2018, when one Praveen Kumar complained against unknown persons for hacking into his company’s account and stealing ₹1,17,56,000. The police lodged an FIR under Sections 420, 467, 468, 471 of the IPC and Section 66 of the IT Act. Following an investigation by Cyber Cell and Meerut police, two accused were arrested on May 11. They have been identified as Gaurav Soni from Nainital and Nitin Chauhan from Ghaziabad, the police said.
SSP (Meerut) Nitin Tiwari said Gaurav led them to three accused. “More persons are involved in this case and the mastermind is still at large. They have cheated many people across the country and the amount of fraud could be around ₹10 crore. A number of ATM cards and cheque books have been recovered from them. We are investigating the role of telecom companies and bank officials in the case,” the officer said.
Modus operandi
Police sources said the accused used to duplicate SIM cards of their targets.
“After this, they would change the password of the person’s Aadhaar card and hack their account. Then they would transfer the money into accounts of people they knew and paid them commission,” the sources added.
