Ahmedabad: US hacker dupes bizman of Rs 25 lakh, cops freeze foreign accounts to recover money

A textile businessman was allegedly duped of Rs 25 lakh in Ahmedabad in January. A complaint was lodged with the Cyber Cell of Police. The businessman was planning to buy machines for his cloth processing factory and had reportedly emailed his bank details to one Dhaval Gandhi. Later, the agent's mail email was reportedly hacked.

Durgaprasad Jain is a resident of Shahibaug and the general manager of the company on CTM crossroads. Jain had contacted a Mumbai-based company, Italy Lafer Spa, through agent Gandhi. Gandhi had allegedly sent him an invoice of Rs 25lakh to Jain on January 31.

On February 1, Gandhi's email was allegedly hacked by and the banking details were diverted to an unknown account. The machinery company later also said they never received the money.

Digging into the cyber robbery, the cops found that the account was created with the Barclays Bank in the United Kingdom. The amount was transferred to a Commerzbank account in Germany. Later, the money was slipped to Banco Ganadero Bank, South America.

The police immediately contacted the bank authorities, the American embassy and the Indian embassy to freeze the money. As per cyber cell sleuths, the money has been returned to Jain.

Police say that there is an American hacker behind the entire act and they are trying to gather more details about him.