The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : Spaniard, Nigerians behind cyber crime

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Dec 05, 2007
ePaper

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

Spaniard, Nigerians behind cyber crime

S. Ramu

Impostors trap gullible persons through emails with online lotteries as bait

MIRYALGUDA (NALGONDA DT): A Spaniard Mark Staford and more than a dozen Nigerians were reportedly involved in cheating people through e-mails. “Staford used to contact persons through e-mails and inform them that they had won an attractive cash prize in the Spanish Euro lottery. He used to trap the gullible who would reply evincing interest to know more details,” an investigator told The Hindu on Tuesday.

Staford never hesitated to contact such people over the phone. “He created a duplicate website of the Madrid Bank and used to mislead the ‘lottery winners’,” he said.

“I opened the website of Madrid Bank through the link he gave in an e-mail and contacted one Antonio Gomez of the bank with the help of the phone number given by Staford,” one of the victims revealed. Gomez, who was also involved with the gang, told this victim that a huge amount won by him in the lottery had been deposited in the Madrid Bank. “I was carried away by Gomez’s official confirmation and followed the instructions given by Stanford through phone,” he elaborated.

Staford would first demand the ‘ winner’ to deposit an amount in Park Central Bank of Johannesburg in South Africa as activation fee. Later, he would ask for more money to convert Euros into Indian currency. “If Staford thinks that the ‘winner’ is dim-witted, he takes him for a ride further with the help of young Nigerians. He gives the phone numbers of the Nigerians to be contacted at Mumbai to collect the money boxes,” an investigator said.

Bargaining

The intriguing point for the investigators was, the top secret the arrested Nigerians maintained during the interrogation, the police said. It is also learnt that the gang bargained with those who approached the police against these cyber criminals. The Nigerians used to take their gang members back to Mumbai after extra payment through their lawyers.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Andhra Pradesh