Pramesh S Jain
Cyber fraudsters siphoned off over Rs.1.5 lakh probe reveals organised racket in Bihar.
The Sadashivanagar police have arrested a 25-year-old man from Bihar for allegedly hacking the mobile phones of Kannada actor Upendra,his wife and actress Priyanka Upendra,and their manager, and cheating several people of lakhs of rupees through cyber fraud.
The arrested accused has been identified as Vikas Kumar,a resident of Dashrathpur in Bihar.
According to the police,on September 15,Priyanka Upendra had ordered a few items online when she received a suspicious link on her mobile phone.
Believing it to be genuine,she clicked on it after the sender insisted she share an OTP.Soon after,her WhatsApp account was hacked.
The hackers then messaged several contacts from her phone,claiming she was in an emergency and urgently needed money.
Many,including close friends and associates,transferred around Rs.55,000 each to the account shared by the fraudsters.
Priyanka soon realised her phone was compromised and tried calling her husband Upendra and their manager — only to find that their phones,too,had been hacked.Even her son reportedly transferred Rs.50,000, thinking his mother was in trouble.
By the time Priyanka discovered the fraud, the hackers had siphoned off over Rs.1.5 lakh from various people. She immediately lodged a complaint at the Sadashivanagar police station.
Acting on the complaint,the police tracked the digital trail and found that the accused were operating from Dashrathpur in Bihar, where several youths are allegedly involved in similar cybercrime activities.
A police team travelled to Bihar and was shocked to learn that around 150 youngsters in the area were engaged in cyber fraud.
The team eventually arrested Vikas Kumar and brought him to Bengaluru.
He is currently in police custody and being interrogated by the Central Division Cyber Crime Unit and Sadashivanagar police.
The investigation is ongoing to trace other members of the racket.
