HYDERABAD: In a major breakthrough, the Hyderabad Cybercrime police have apprehended nine people allegedly involved in a sophisticated investment fraud that is linked to the financing of terrorist activities by the Lebanon-based militant outfit Hezbollah.
Giving details of the case, Hyderabad Police Commissioner CV Anand identified the arrested accused as Prakash Mulchandbhai Prajapati, Kumar Prajapati, Naimuddin Wahiduddin Shaik, Gagan Kumar Soni, Parvez alias Guddu, Shameer Khan, Mohammed Munawar, Shah Sumair, and Arul Dass, hailing from Mumbai, Ahmedabad, and Hyderabad.
The Police Commissioner said that the investigation into the case began when a resident of Chikkadpally filed a cheating complaint.
According to the complaint, the victim was approached through the Telegram app and lured into a part-time “Rate and Review” job through a website https://www.traveling-boost-99.com.
The victim initially earned profits of Rs 866 by performing simple tasks with an initial investment of Rs 1,000. However, as the tasks progressed, the fraudsters manipulated the victim into investing larger sums of money. Despite earning significant profits, the victim was denied withdrawal access, leading to a total loss of Rs 28 lakh, the Police Commissioner said.
Investigating the complaint, the cybercrime police discovered that the defrauded funds were channelled into various Indian bank accounts before reaching Dubai, where the money was utilised to purchase cryptocurrencies, CV Anand revealed.
Chinese masterminds behind cyber fraud
The sleuths traced one of the accounts to Radhika Marketing, linked to Mohammed Munawar from Hyderabad. Further inquiries revealed that Munawar, along with Arul Dass, Shah Sumair, and Shameer Khan, had travelled to Lucknow under the instruction of Manish, Vikas, and Rajesh to open multiple bank accounts for shell companies. These companies were later sold to Kumar Prajapathi, an associate of Prakash Prajapathi, the city police chief said.
Prakash Prajapathi, based in Ahmedabad, was found to have connections with Chinese nationals, identified as Lee Lou Guangzhou, Nan Ye, and Kevin Jun.
Once the Chinese received the defrauded funds, Prakash Prajapathi coordinated with his associates in Mumbai, who were settled in Dubai, to convert the Indian currency to USDT (a cryptocurrency) and transfer it to China. For each fraudulent transaction, Prakash received a 2% to 3% commission, Anand said.
During the investigation, it was uncovered that Prakash Prajapathi’s crypto-wallet had links to another wallet associated with the notorious Hezbollah, labelled as a “terror financing module” in various countries. The terror-linked wallet had sanctions imposed against it, raising serious concerns about the flow of illicit funds. Further investigations revealed that Prakash had supplied over 65 accounts to the Chinese, with transactions amounting to Rs128 crore. The other accounts involved in converting the fraudulently obtained money to USDT held a staggering volume of Rs 584 crores, resulting in a total siphoned amount of over Rs 712 crore.