NEW DELHI: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has arrested Dwibendu Moharana for allegedly cheating Japanese citizens through fake customer service calls under the guise of providing them with technical support.
Moharana, who had been absconding since May this year, was arrested at Bhubaneswar airport on Thursday upon his return from the UAE.
According to officials, he was allegedly the mastermind behind an illegal Noida-based call centre, VoIP Connect Pvt Ltd, that impersonated technical support executives of reputed multinational companies to extort money from unsuspecting victims abroad.
Moharana’s name surfaced during the agency’s raids on May 28 this year at 19 locations across Delhi, Haryana, and Uttar Pradesh, which led to the arrest of six operatives. The accused had fled India a day later, evading investigators as the Noida call centre was busted.
“Moharana’s network targeted Japanese citizens using sophisticated social engineering techniques and deception. Victims were tricked into believing their systems were compromised and were coerced into transferring funds as ‘support charges’,” a CBI official said.
The arrest marks a major step in Operation Chakra-V, an ongoing crackdown on global cybercrime networks.
After his arrest, Moharana was brought to Delhi on a transit warrant and produced before a special CBI court, which remanded him in police custody for three days for interrogation. The agency said seven people have been arrested in the case so far, and charge sheets have been filed against all of them.
Officials said the operation was executed in close coordination with Japan’s National Police Agency and Microsoft Corporation, whose cybersecurity teams provided critical technical inputs. The joint effort has significantly disrupted the fraud syndicate’s global operations, the agency added.
