Two held for illegally routing international phone calls
HYDERABAD: In a joint operation, theSouth Zone Task Force, Team, alongside officials from the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) and Santosh Nagar police, have apprehended two persons involved in an illegal call routing scheme.
The accused, Hidayath Ali and Mujahed Ahmed, allegedly diverted incoming international calls into local calls using Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) equipment. According to officials, this practice circumvented standard telecom infrastructure, resulting in financial losses for the DoT and posed a threat to national security, the police said.
Acting on a tip-off, authorities raided two locations in Hyderabad. The accused were using multiple internet connections, SIM boxes, and BSNL SIM cards to redirect calls from foreign locations (such as UAE, Qatar, Saudi Arabia) to local Indian mobile numbers. This manipulation of caller line identification (CLI) made the calls untraceable.
A case has been registered at Santosh Nagar police station under various sections of the IPC, the Information Technology Act, the Indian Wireless Telegraphy Act and the IT Act.
Cops seized 204 BSNL SIM cards, 12 SIM boxes of various capacities, three routers, six laptops, two hard disks, eight cell phones and four monitors.