Banker, part of ‘digital arrest’ gang, held in Rs 84L scam in Noida

Noida: A private bank employee who, along with others, placed a woman under ‘digital arrest' last year and cheated her of Rs 84 lakh was arrested on Wednesday. Earlier, three people had been arrested in the case. DCP (Cyber) Preeti Yadav said Sonu Pal, a resident of Sitapur who worked with IDFC First Bank in Mohali (Punjab) as an assistant manager, and his accomplices cheated the woman in June last year "by posing as law enforcement officials and placed her under digital arrest". Pal's main job was to provide bank accounts to fraudsters. Earlier this year, the police arrested Ram Singh, Narendra and Akshay involved in the fraud. Pal's name came up during the investigation.
According to the complaint lodged at the Cyber Crime police station last year, the woman said she was contacted by fraudsters from June 23 to 25. They said her name was connected to a parcel of drugs and kept her engaged on a video call for two days. They got her entire bank account amount, Rs 84.16 lakh, transferred to various accounts by employing threats and pressures.
‘Digital arrest' is a type of scam where fraudsters contact people online or through WhatsApp calls and claim they are implicated in some illegal activity, such as involvement in a crime or tax evasion. They then threaten to arrest the targets and pressure them to transfer money to their accounts.
Pal opened an account in the name of Ram Singh, one of the accused arrested earlier, and kept the kit with himself. Rs 69 lakh of fraud money was transferred in several instalments to this account, a large chunk of which he kept as commission. Police raided possible hideouts of Pal for the past several days. The management of the bank has also been informed about his involvement in the fraud.
During interrogation, Pal revealed that he used to give tempting offers to people, including getting them benefits of govt schemes. If someone was ill in the house and if one needed a loan immediately, Sonu got accounts opened, but would keep the kits with himself. After some time, the bank account and all the information related to it would reach the gang of thugs. In return, Sonu used to take a huge commission. He has been involved in such frauds since last year.