Gurgaon: Chasing money trail after a cyber fraud was reported in the city, city cops last week took into custody a 24-year-old woman from Delhi’s IGI airport on the suspicion that she was allegedly part of a Cambodia-based gang that targeted Indians with ‘digital arrests’. Khushboo, police said, belongs to Surat in Gujarat and told cops that she was working at a call centre owned by Chinese citizens in an area called Mango Park in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.At the call centre, staffers were allegedly taught to pose as police, CBI and customs officials to threaten online users and extort.“In the first stage, victims are told their documents are linked to illegal activities. Then, impersonators posing as CBI officers appear on video calls, claiming to ‘digitally arrest’ the person. Finally, scammers pretending to be income tax or customs officials extort money under the guise of investigation clearance,” said Priyanshu Dewan, ACP (cyber).The ACP was leading the investigation into the Cambodia-based operations after an 81-year-old Gurgaon resident filed a complaint that she was cheated of Rs 2.9 crore in Dec 2024.The complainant said a caller claimed her Aadhaar card was linked to hawala transactions. Cyber cons then forced her to stay on a video call — or “digital arrest” — for three days while another person posing as a CBI officer coerced her into transferring money to avoid arrest.Based on this complaint, an FIR was registered at the Cyber East police station in the city under sections 318(4) (cheating), 336(3) (forgery), 348 (making or possession of any instrument for counterfeiting a property mark) and 340 (forged document) of BNS. Khushboo, investigators said, is the 16th accused to be arrested in the case. Cops arrested her from the Delhi airport on June 28 after getting a tip-off that she was flying back to India. During questioning, Khushboo told police she initially went to Dubai in search of a job in Nov 2023. From there, her friend’s husband took her to Cambodia in Aug 2024. She joined the call centre and was paid 700$ (approximately Rs 60,000) to carry out cyber frauds. “Khushboo was assigned to the first team, which initiated contact with targets and instilled fear by mentioning criminal charges,” said inspector Amit Sharma, in charge of the Cyber East police station.The 24-year-old said her colleagues at the Mango Park call centre were Indians, and there were several other call centres like theirs across the southeast Asian country. The amount that the gang amassed from cybercrimes was allegedly funneled through a network of fake accounts, police said.Cops traced one account, in which Rs 39 lakh was transferred, owned by another Indian citizen, Surendra. He allegedly gave access to the account to cyber cons in return for Rs 5 lakh.Police said the investigation in the case is ongoing.
