Mumbai, A 36-year-old graphic designer who once narrowly escaped a ‘digital arrest’ scam went on to create malicious software that helped cyber fraudsters cheat more than 9,600 people out of ₹ 150 crore, police said on Thursday.
“Five years ago, Gupta closely escaped a digital arrest scam. Indore resident Pankaj Gupta was arrested by the Property Cell of the Mumbai Crime Branch for allegedly creating and supplying 2,805 malicious Android Package Kit files to cybercriminal networks operating out of Bihar and Jharkhand, said officials. Police said Gupta rented servers from various companies to host the K data and sold each malicious file to ground-level calling modules for ₹ 20,000 to ₹ 25,000.
Instead of staying away, he spotted a business opportunity and reached out to fraudsters, offering them custom-built K files that act as digital ‘remote controls’ to compromise target smartphones,” a senior police officer said. Gupta, who knew coding, created K files disguised as popular government and utility services, including senior citizen card verification, e-traffic challans, pension verification, credit card updates, and PM Kisan Yojana portals, police said.
“The victim received a call from an individual posing as a nationalised bank representative offering assistance with a Senior Citizen Card scheme. Upon clicking an K link sent via text, ₹ 5.62 lakh was fraudulently debited from his account,” the official said.
Further investigation into the network and its ground-level operatives is underway, the official added.
