Dumka: Fourteen alleged cyber fraudsters were arrested in separate raids in Deoghar and Jamtara districts for duping people using fake APK files and impersonating as customer care executives, bank officials and govt representatives, officials said on Saturday.Ten youths were arrested from Patharddah outpost area in a raid on Friday. Fifteen mobiles, 18 SIM cards and an ATM card were seized from their possession. Cyber DSP Kailash Prasad Mahato said the accused posed as representatives of e-commerce and digital payment platforms. They also allegedly sent APK files to victims in the name of PM-Kisan benefits, electricity bills and RTO challans.“The accused lured people into downloading fraudulent APK files to gain access to their mobile phones. Posing as bank officials, they claimed that the cards of the customers had been blocked and offered to reactivate them as a pretext to commit fraud,” Mahato said.Four of the Deoghar accused — Uttam Rana, Kailash Das, Kundan Kumar Das and Manuwar Ansari — had previously been arrested in cybercrime cases and sent to jail, police said.In Jamtara, four alleged members of another cyber fraud network were arrested during raids at Dudhni in Karmatanr police station area and Sonbad under Jamtara police station. The operation was conducted by a team led by Cyber DSP Amit Kumar. The accused are aged between 19-34 years. Thirteen mobile phones, 13 SIM cards, eight ATM cards, a cheque book and Rs 2.2 lakh in cash were seized from them.“The accused were allegedly sending fake APK files to customers of Haryana City Gas and Adani Gas on the pretext of updating gas bills. Once the APK was installed, they could access sensitive information stored on the victims’ phones and use it for cyber fraud,” SP Shambhu Kumar Singh said.Police also searched the house of another man, suspected to be involved in cyber frauds, and found evidence and cash allegedly linked to cybercrime.
