Punjab Police busts two fake call centres duping people living in US; 155 held
May 17, 2024
Chandigarh (Punjab) [India], May 17 : The Cyber Crime Division of the Punjab Police has busted two fake Call Centres running in Mohali and arrested 155 employees of these centres for making fraudulent calls to people living in US and duping them, said Director General of Police (DGP) Punjab Gaurav Yadav here on Friday.
The first fake Call centre was located at Plot at Sector 74 in SAS Nagar, while, the other fake Call Centre was established at A-one Tower at Sector 74 of SAS Nagar. Both the call centres seemed to be run by Gujarat-based kingpins.
DGP Gaurav Yadav said that preliminary investigations have revealed that the fake call centres were operating during the night and callers were using three different modus operandi to dupe foreign nationals by making them purchase gift cards of Target, Apple, Amazon, etc. These gift cards are shared by a team manager and redeemed by the owner, he added.
ADGP Cyber Crime V Neeraja, while addressing a press conference, said that intelligence inputs about fake Call Centres operating in Mohali targeting foreigners living abroad was developed by Inspector Gaganpreet Singh and Inspector Daljit Singh along with their team with technical assistance from digital investigation training and analysis centre (DITAC) Lab of Cybercrime.
She said that after zeroing in on the locations, Police teams under the supervision of SP Cybercrime Jashandeep Singh, led by DSP Prabhjot Kaur raided both the fake Call centres on the intervening night of Tuesday and Wednesday, and arrested all the 155 employees who were working as Diallers, Closers, Bankers and Floor Managers. However, both the kingpins are absconding and police teams are working to nab them, she added.
She said that police teams have also recovered 79 desktop computer units, 204 laptops, mobile phones, and other accessories etc, besides scripts for training to talk to the customers.
ADGP V Neeraja said that out of the total 155 arrested, 18 employees were taken on police remand, while, the rest all the arrested persons were sent on Judicial remand. Further investigation to ascertain the total fraud committed is in progress, she said, while adding that more arrests are expected in the coming days.
An FIR has been registered under sections 419, 420, 467, 468, 471 and 120B of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and sections 66C and 66D of the Information Technology (IT) Act at Police Station State Cyber Crime Cell.
