Jamshedpur: In a significant breakthrough, the Govindpur Police have arrested Sumrit Kumar Mandal, a member of a gang involved in deceiving individuals by posing as KYC update agents and persuading them to close their bank accounts. The arrest took place in Subhash Nagar, Govindpur, and the police have recovered valuable evidence from the accused.
Sumrit Kumar Mandal, a resident of Kebanka district in Bihar, was apprehended in a rented house during the police raid. The seized items include 10 mobile phones, 32 SIM cards, and a sum of nine thousand rupees. The Cyber DSP, Jayshree Kujur, shared this information during a press conference at the Cyber Police Station.
The case came to light when Abhishek Pandey from Nagpur filed a complaint on the NCCRP cyber portal, reporting a fraudulent withdrawal of Rs 70,000 from his bank account under the pretext of KYC updating. Another victim had also fallen prey to the scam, losing Rs 24,000. Upon investigation, the police traced the location of the fraudster to Govindpur.
The Govindpur Police, led by Incharge Amit Kumar Singh, collaborated with the technical branch to pinpoint the location of Sumrit Kumar Mandal. A raid was swiftly conducted, resulting in the arrest of Sumrit. However, the main perpetrators, including gang leader Pradeep Kumar Mandal and members Kundan Kumar Mandal and Tulsi Kumar Mandal, managed to evade capture and are currently on the run.
The modus operandi of the gang involved convincing victims to update their KYC details and threatening to close their bank accounts if they refused. The scammers coerced victims into downloading the AnyDesk app, filling out a form with account and card details. With this information, the fraudsters withdrew money from the victims’ bank accounts.
The arrested Sumrit Kumar Mandal disclosed that after committing the fraud, he would withdraw money from ATMs and hand it over to the mastermind, who retained 60% of the proceeds, with the remaining 40% distributed among the gang members. The accused had rented a house in Subhash Nagar for six months, posing as job seekers while orchestrating their criminal activities. Police are actively conducting raids to apprehend the absconding members of the gang.
Confiscating mobile phones etc. like this once in a while may not help in stopping the menace these cyber criminals have become. To stay safer from scams in general, always use tools like Phishbowl (this proudly Indian app is on both App Store and Play Store) that lets you do free checks on phone numbers, UPI IDs, fraud websites, telegram links etc. used by scammers. You can also get it from the official website phish-bowl.in/LandingPage