Delhi crime branch unearth credit card fraud targeting US users

The crime branch of Delhi Police unearths a major international credit card racket. Police arrested two former employees of a multinational bank for being allegedly involved in a major international credit card racket. Police has seized a machine used to commit the fraud from the accused.

The accused, identified as Manoj Gupta (24) and Saurabh Dwivedi (25), had an interesting technique of carrying out a fraud. The duo had contact at Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, Mohammad Hassan, used to befriend American tourists and make them swipe their credit cards in a machine which could read and store data from the magnetic strip. Then the information was passed on to the accused via email. On the other hand the accused used to secure credit cards in India using fake documents like PAN cards, etc. Then they used to replace the information of the Indian card with that of a genuine American credit card said the police.

The accused were able to get more people involved in the chain, particularly lower-rung employees who used to operate swipe machines at petrol pumps and shopping centers. These employees "agents" would use the credit cards, keep 5% of the amount, and hand over the rest of the money to the duo. The Malaysian contact got 40% of the share via Western Union money transfer. And the unlucky credit card owner in the US got an inflated bill.

As Anil Shukla, DCP, crime and railways, said: "The genuine credit card holder, back in US, came to know of the crime only in the next billing cycle. He would contest the claim and ultimately the loss would be borne either by the American bank or insurance agency. Since the fraud occurred in India, no one pursued the matter any further."

"They were clever enough to use Indian names on the cards to avoid suspicion. They got away as few shopkeepers bothered to check the credit card numbers," added the DCP.

As per police reports the gang started operations in around April and collected over Rs 10 lakh, said the police. Police from the accused has seized five forged PAN cards, 18 local credit cards loaded with data of American cards, a card reader machine and Rs 10,000. A machine used to rewrite data, which it seems that the duo had purchased online, has also been recovered.

According to police sources, Dwivedi and Gupta were working in a multinational bank when they came in contact with one Anand Mishra, a resident of Mumbai, who got them introduced to Hassan. Sometime back Mishra was arrested in a similar case. Sources stated from his possession also a machine has been recovered.


Gupta was a XII class pass out, Dwivedi was a graduate. During interrogation the duo told the cops that they possessed data of around 30,000 American cards. So far, cops have recovered 12,028 data entries from their computer. Cops said more arrests are likely in the case.

"Many petrol pumps and shops have actively cooperated with them. The people involved would be arrested. We are also in touch with Mumbai police to bring Mishra here on a transit remand. Efforts are on to trace Hassan in Malaysia," said the DCP.