DP busts international phising racket; 2 Nigerians held

New Delhi, Apr 9 (UNI) The Crime Branch of the Delhi Police has busted an international internet phising racket by arresting three persons, including two Nigerians, for withdrawing money from account holders of private banks through internet banking using their personal details.

DCP (Crime and Railways) Anil Shukla said here that the accused used to send e mails to internet banking users seeking personal details, including personal identification number (PIN). The mail used to carry the logo of the bank, making unsuspeting account holders believe that the e mail was actually sent by the bank. ''The mails were usually short and asked customers to furnish details to enable the bank provide them with better services,'' Mr Shukla added.

The link provided in the e mail connected the customer to a pseudo site not actually managed by the bank.

Using the details, the accused use to transer huge sums of money to another account from where it was withdrawn instantly using 'self' cheques or ATM cards.

The holder of the account where the money was transferred used to get a share. ''One of the accused, Nurul Huda Khan of Manipur used to ontact people willing to receive money in their accounts. The major chunk of the amount withdrawn was transfered through Western Union Money Transfers to Nigeria.

All the accued used to get a certain share from the money withdrawn.

HDFC Bank's Risk Control Unit had contacted the Crime Branch following compliants from customers that money was transferred from their accounts without their knowledge. ''Tewnty three cases have come to the notice of Crime Branch and te banks...most of the complaints are from Delhi, Chennai, Karnataka and Maharashtra,'' the DCP added.

The Crime Branch and the HDFC staff laid a trap which resulted in the arrest of Khan and later Ibimina Joshua and Fellx Awatefe.

Two laptop computers, Rs 60,000 in cash, two forged South Korean passports, an expired Nigerian passport, 17 debit/credit cards, one forged PAN card and some charge and withdrawl slips of various banks were recovered from them.

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