Monday, 01 May 2023 | PNS | DEHRADUN
The Uttarakhand Special Task Force (STF) arrested a cyber criminal gang member Wasim Akram (28) from Gurugram late on Saturday night. More than 2,000 complaints are registered against him across the country. The accused has allegedly committed several crimes across the country including online fraud through loan apps and by posing as a customer care service representative besides being involved in sextortion, phishing and identity theft among several others, said the deputy superintendent of police (DSP) of the cyber crime police station, STF, Ankush Mishra. He said that the STF started its investigation in the state when a Dehradun resident Sudhir Kumar from the Harrawala area filed a complaint against a man who claimed to be an army personnel and duped him of Rs 6.5 lakh under the pretext of selling him his car through an online platform OLX, which is used to buy and sell used cars. He said that the case was handed over to the sub-inspector of the cyber crime police station in Dehradun Kuldeep Tamta to start the investigation. He said that the STF team gathered evidence against the accused and finally nabbed him from the Badshahpur area of Gurugram late on Saturday night. He said that it was revealed during the investigation that the accused had allegedly used 14 different phones to commit various crimes across the country and had duped hundreds of people along with his gang members. They allegedly indulge in a range of online frauds to dupe people all over the country and over 2,000 victims have registered complaints against them as per the STF’s preliminary inquiry, said Mishra. Talking about duping the complainant in Dehradun, he said that the accused usually posed as an Indian Army personnel on OLX where he posts details of a car to sell. The DSP said that the accused has also blackmailed many people by making obscene video calls through WhatsApp and recording them for extortion. He said that the STF is gathering more evidence in the case to nab other accused too.
