Hyderabad cops arrest three in Bengal for theft of Rs 36 lakh via SIM swap

HYDERABAD:  The Hyderabad Cyber Crime Police on Saturday arrested three persons in West Bengal for duping many in the city via SIM swapping.

The arrested persons are Sagar Mahato, Kumar Gaurav Singh and Sanjay Agarwal.

A complaint the police received stated that the victim had three accounts with a bank, all of them linked to his email and his mobile numbers.

An amount of Rs 35,89,899 was fraudulently transferred to other accounts from the three accounts. In addition, the mobile number registered with his bank accounts got disconnected.

The victim came to know that five beneficiary accounts had been added into the three accounts without his knowledge.

During investigation, police identified the accused and traced them.

They found that a Nigerian national, Shedrick Paul, would send links to the mail IDs of bank customers, promising a refund for some transaction. Once the customer would click on the links, their phone would be compromised, and Paul would gain credentials of their bank accounts.

Then, Mahato would obtain a new SIM card of the victim’s number. In this way, the customer’s SIM card would be blocked, while Mahato’s card would be activated.