BHUBANESWAR: Police on Saturday arrested four youths for allegedly operating a mule account supply network from Bhadrak district that channelled proceeds of investment scams worth crores of rupees and maintained links with Chinese operators.
The accused are 24-year-old Sai Subham Suar who opened the fake current accounts in the name of a non-existent firm, Bhabani Sankar Roy (21) who activated internet banking and shared access through malicious APK files, Shishir Kumar Jena (26), the main agent who communicated with suspected Chinese operators via Telegram and received payments in USDT through crypto exchanges, and Biswajit Jena (20) who managed accounts and crypto trades.
While Sai is a graduate, Bhabani is a law student, Biswajit a BTech student and Shishir an engineering dropout. The Cyber Crime and Economic Offence police had registered a case in this regard on August 20 following a complaint by a Bhubaneswar resident that he had been induced through a Facebook message and a WhatsApp group named ‘Finsol Insights Exchange’ to invest Rs 91.90 lakh earlier in July.
The complainant alleged that he was promised double returns but found his accounts blocked when he attempted to withdraw the funds. Investigation revealed that the cheated amount was diverted into local mule account held at Bank of India’s Sailashree Vihar branch here.
Police probe further uncovered an organised network that recruited young people to open savings and current accounts, often using fabricated documents and non-existent businesses and then supplied these accounts to fraudsters operating outside Odisha.
During investigation, police seized eight mobile phones containing chat logs, transaction histories, trade accounts and APK files. The accused used applications such as Ninja VPN (virtual private network) to mask IP addresses used to commit cyber frauds, said the police.
The accused received commissions from scamsters operating outside Odisha and they transported the mule account kits by bus to West Bengal and other states. Once the mule accounts received fraudulent transfers, funds were quickly moved or converted into virtual currency, police added.
