Cyber cell arrests man for siphoning off lakhs from elderly’s a/c

The cyber crime investigation cell (CCIC) of the city crime branch, on Monday, arrested a 24-year old man from Chennai for his alleged involvement in the siphoning of lakhs of rupees from the bank account of a 69-year-old retired senior government officer. Police said the siphoning was done around 300 times.

The arrested has been identified as Vivek Manoharan, resident of Chennai.

According to the police, the victim (name withheld) is a resident of Prabhadevi and has a bank account in the Churchgate branch of a government bank. In June last year, the victim learnt that several transactions had taken place on his bank account, which he had not been privy to. He then lodged a complaint with the cyber police station at BKC.

“Investigations revealed that between January and June last year, nearly 300 transactions had taken place on the bank account of the victim. The logins and logouts were made from Mumbai, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and Chennai. In some cases cyber cafes were used, in others a data card. The said card belonged to Manoharan,” said a police officer.

He added that railway ticket bookings were made through the siphoned money. “Manoharan had booked a room in Hotel Heritage in Madurai, and had also stayed there. The booking was done through a transaction from the account of the victim. We have recovered three hard disks from Manoharan, and are investigating the case further. He had obtained the password and login ID of the victim’s bank account. He also has three criminal cases registered against him in Chennai,” said the officer.