6th nabbed by Mumbai Crime Branch in bogus call centre case

Mumbai Crime Branch sleuths on Friday arrested sixth person in the case wherein they had raided a call centre in Andheri (W) in September last year for allegedly making fraudulent calls to unsuspecting American citizens. They claimed that their computers have been hit by malware and viruses and duped them. The arrested person was co-partner in the said call centre and was on the run. The group had duped at least 53 American nationals to the tune of 59,100 USD, police probe revealed.

The arrested person has been identified as Taufiq Shaikh (25), a resident of Dahisar (E). Earlier the police had arrested David Alphonso (22), Sandeep Yadav (28), Bipin Sahu (28), Del Jascinto (23) and Shahdab Shaikh (20).

According to the police, on receipt of specific information on September 6, a team of officers from the Bandra Unit of the Crime Branch, headed by inspector Mahesh Desai, raided a call centre situated in Andheri.

The police found 38 people using illegally procured data from US nationals. They were making voice over internet protocol (VoIP) calls to them. "The solution was to give them remote access to their computers, and would pretend to remove the malware of virus, and then seek money for their services. The callers said Alfonso, the owner, would pay them a cash salary of Rs 20,000 for this," a police officer said.