In a first, two Romanians, who were part of a gang that cloned 2,000 debit cards and siphoned off over 50 lakh from bank accounts of Indians, were arrested from a guesthouse in Mumbai.
Gang members had installed skimmers along with secret cameras at ATM kiosks in Hyderabad and Delhi. Police managed to recover 35 lakh from the duo-Vasile
Gabriel Razvan and
Buricea Alexandru Mihai of Romania-at the time of their arrest.
The duo along with their associates, Ticu Bogdan Costinel and
Puica Eugn Marian,
had hatched a plan to clone debit cards of Indians by placing skimmers at ATM centres, Cyberabad police commissioner V C Sajjanar said.
Gabriel researched on the internet about top Indian cities and chose Hyderabad as one of their locations to
steal debit card data. After discussing details with his aides, Gabriel obtained business visas for the gang to visit India.
In December 2017, Gabriel and Alexandru came to Hyderabad and identified ATM kiosks where there were no security guards. After noting down details of the ATMs, the two went to Delhi and looked for ATMs without security guards there. In January 2018, the gang installed skimmers along with secret cameras at ATMs in Delhi and, using the information gathered, cloned debit cards. Using the cloned cards, they withdrew 9.5 lakh from ATMs in Mumbai in January and converted the Indian currency to euros at outlets of a financial services firm.
Gabriel and Alexandru cloned cards while staying at a hotel near the Mumbai international airport.
Representative Image