CRYPTOCURRENCY FRAUD: 3 ARRESTED

LUCKNOW: The Special Task Force on Sunday arrested three people here for online and cryptocurrency fraud.

The STF recovered 16 ATM cards and other documents from them. All three accused, who hail from Bihar, were cheating people in the name of jobs. They have been identified as Rakesh Kumar Singh, Bittu Yadav and Pradeep Dev.

SSP, STF Lucknow Rajiv Narayan Mishra said they had been tracking such fraud cases for long. On the basis of electronic and physical surveillance, the STF got an information that three people involved in the fraud were coming to Lucknow from Kushinagar. The STF laid a trap on the intervening night of Saturday and Sunday and arrested them near Kamta Trisection.

“They are part of a gang who targets people aspiring for jobs abroad. They contact such aspirants and ask them deposit some money in different accounts and then stop the communication,” said an STF official.

They arrested accused worked as picker, - a person who arranges bank accounts. A person sitting abroad or using a SIM card of a foreign country known as a scammer. The scammer interacts with job aspirants and asks them to deposit money in different accounts. The scammer issues fake job related documents and when the money is deposited in bank accounts arranged by pickers, he stops communicating.

Later pickers transfer the money to scammer through bitcoins after deducting their commission. The probe revealed that a Moradabad-based agent transferred the money in cryptocurrency to a scammer.