Kalpetta: The cyber cell sleuths have nabbed the main culprit in the Rs 6.5-lakh online trading fraud in the district from Thrissur.
The accused TS Harikrishna, 21, of Kizhakke Kodali, Vellikulangara, was arrested by the Cyber Cell team from his home on Friday evening. Cops zeroed in on the culprit by tracking the cash flow, sources said.
The cash that was transferred by the victim, a native of Vythiri, to the online trading company, was credited to an account in Kolkata, This was transferred to a South Indian Bank account in Harikrishna's name. Later the money was transferred to various IDs as cryptocurrency through the Binance App, police said.
Police said they had sufficient evidence that Harikrishna was the chief operator of the scam. He converted the huge sums of money received from various frauds to cryptocurrency, and used to receive a commission for the same, they said.
Police also seized around seven ATM cards, mobile phones and ZIM cards from the accused. Cops said Harikrishna received more than Rs 50 lakh in a month from various suspicious sources. They have intensified their investigation to nab others involved in the fraud.
Modus operandi
The racketeers win the faith of the victims through repeated interaction over WhatsApp chats and convince them that huge profits could be gained through online trade. The Vythiri native invested Rs 6.5 lakh in the online trading business in May. He was cajoled to 'sign in' to a fake trading portal which has details of traders; the profit gained by individuals with their names and details of the huge transactions.
As the person from Vythiri, investors realise that they have been tricked only when they try to withdraw the money along with the 'accumulated profit'. Apart from Cyber police station inspector Shaju Joseph, additional sub-inspector Rassack, CPOs Muhammed Anees and PP Praveen were part of the team that nabbed the culprit.
