Hyderabad: Cloning of ATM Cards gang was busted by the Cyber Crime unit of Cyberabad. Two Romanians were arrested for defrauding the innocent citizens and seized Rs 35,00,00 from their possession.
The accused were identified as Vasile Gabriel Razvan, Buricea Alexandru Mihai, Ticu Bogdan Costinel (absconding) and Puica Eugn Marian (absconding). Cyber police said they received a complaint from one M. Anil Bhargava of Kukatpally stating he has a savings bank account with ICICI Bank at Uppal Kalan Branch and on May 4 an amount of Rs one lakh has been withdrawn from his bank account from Goregaon branch, Mumbai. He called the customer care division of ICICI bank about the fraud and later requested the Cyber Crime Police for taking necessary action.
The Cyber Crime Police Station, Cyberabad registered a case and started investigation. Besides, 45 similar complaints were lodged with the Cyber Crime Police Station, Cyberabad so far. The sleuths identified four ATM centers in Mumbai from which the amounts were withdrawn by the accused. Immediately, the Cyber Crime team proceeded to Mumbai and collected the details of the accused.
The accused Vasile Gabriel Razvan, who is a Romanian, hatched a plan to collect debit cards data at ATMs by placing Skimmers at ATM centers and to withdraw the amounts. Most of Romanians and Bulgarians are into the similar frauds in the European countries. Gabriel selected Hyderabad to fix the Skimmer and collect the cards data. He shared the same to his friends Alexandru, Bogdan & Marian for which they all agreed for his proposal. For that Gabriel applied for the Passport and obtained Business VISA to all their team members to visit India.
Initially, Gabriel and Alexandru came to Hyderabad in December last year and identified the ATM centers, where there were no security guards. Later, Gabriel and Alexandru went to Delhi in December last and kept the Skimmers in the ATM centers at Delhi in January this year and withdrew the amounts in Mumbai by using the cloned cards to the tune of Rs 9,50,000 and converted the same to Western Union outlets during January this year.
As per instructions of Gabriel, Ticu Bogdan Costinel and Puica Eugn Marian, who are his friends came to Hyderabad and kept the skimmers in different ATM centers in Hyderabad in the month of February and March this year. After collecting the cards data through skimmers, Bogdan and Marian left India in April. In April, Gabriel and Alexandru went to Mumbai with the cards data, cloned the cards by staying in a hotel near Airport and withdrew the amounts from different ATMs to the tune of Rs 35,00,000 at Goregaon and Malad of Mumbai.
In this case, the accused were taken into custody at Hyderabad by Cyber Crime Police. The cops seized cash of Rs 35,00,000, Skimmed cards (196) , Camera Panels (6) , MSR Machine (1) , ATM Card Skimmers (6), External Hard disk (2), Mobile Phones (7) , Passports (2) and Laptop (Acer Model) AXIS Bank ATM, Vijay Nagar Colony, Hyderabad.
They installed skimmer on February 3 and removed it on the next day. Again the skimmer was installed in the same ATM on February 8 and removed it on the next day. (NSS)