The north district police has busted a gang of “cyber criminals” consisting of five foreign nationals who were active in the national Capital especially in Malviya Nagar area of south Delhi and Sadar Bazar of north Delhi, targetting ATMs.
Recovered from their possessions were 102 cloned plastic cards, Rs 94,000 cash, two laptops, four mobile phones, one skimming device and one camera from their possession.
All foreign nationals were from Romania, a European country. Their gang consisted of two women and three men who used to withdraw money from unguarded and isolated ATMs using cloned plastic cards.
The accused have been identified as Castache Irina (27), Caragica Elisabeta (22), Lavtaru Ion (38), Dumitro Nicolae (36) and Nistor Llie (36) all residents of Romania and used to visit India to steal money by cloning debit cards.
According to Nupur Prasad, the Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP), North district, a trap was laid down outside the IDBI bank ATM Machine in Sadar Bazaar after investigators zeroed on the activities of these fraudsters.
“In this regard, police directed a bank manager of IDBI Bank to reinstall the skimming device and camera device in the same ATM machine. At about 03:30 PM on Sunday, police noticed that two women with masked face entered the ATM machine and took the skimming device and camera device from the ATM machine. But, they were apprehended by the team,” said the DCP.
“During interrogation the accused disclosed about their associates. On their instance other remaining three accused were also nabbed by the police team,” said the DCP.
Explaining their modus operandi, the DCP said that the accused used to visit India frequently and identified crowded places for installing the skimming machine and camera in the ATM machines for capturing the data of customers.
“They transferred data of customers captured through skimming device into other plastic cards having magnetic strip and converted it into ATM cards and wrote down PIN numbers over them. They used to identify unmanned ATM booths in Delhi, cover their faces, helmets, goggles and withdrew money with cloned plastic cards,” said the DCP adding that further investigation is going on”.
Following the development, residents have been told to be on alert while going to an Automated Teller Machine (ATM), as chances are that your debit card can be cloned within seconds and fraudster can easily access your account and do transactions.