Mangalore: Police Bust Credit Card Cloning Racket, Arrest Two
Pics: Ramesh Pandith / Spoorthi Ullal
Daijiworld Media Network – Mangalore (PS)
Mangalore, Feb 25: The city police have arrested two persons on charges of cloning and skimming credit cards of various foreign banks. The case was solved by the city crime branch (CCB) police who arrested Zeeshan Mohammed (24), a native of Bangalore and Kelwyn Patel (26), a native of Gujarat, who resides in Kudroli here.
City police commissioner Seemanth Kumar Singh held a press meet at his office on Saturday February 25 and informed that acting on a tip off, Mangalore CCB police laid a trap near Hotel Ocean Pearl and took the duo into custody.
Six credit cards of various banks like American Express, Standard Chartered and City Bank were seized from them. Also, the software they used for manufacturing fake credit cards and to transfer the credit card numbers and bank account numbers to the fake ones, a laptop used for installing the software to include writer and reader software, swipe magnetic card, IC card, reader and writer equipment were seized.
The arrested duo possessed purchase receipts amounting to Rs 3.5 lac from Leela Palace in Bangalore and from a shop in Goa. Also, the police seized mobile phones and an internet modem.
They used to steal the bank account numbers and credit card numbers of account holders of foreign banks and with the help of the software, affix those details to the fake credit card which they had. In the mobile seized from them, various details like account number and credit card numbers have been found.
The police commissioner said that the arrested seem to have thorough knowledge about software and banking. They will be handed over to the CCB police for further investigation and the help of bank expert will be taken during investigation, he added.
He also suspected some shop keepers being involved in the crime as the duo did not purchase the goods, but took cash from them instead.
On the recent allegations against some policemen that they had 'fixed' the raid of a beauty parlour for not getting 'hafta', the commissioner said that investigation will be done and if any police personnel is found guilty, action will be taken. However, action cannot be taken based only on media reports, he said.
Regarding the surrender of Wahid, co-accused in the rape case of a minor girl, he said that Wahid has been remanded in judicial custody and the search for his accomplice, Mubarak, is on.
DCP (law and order) Mutthuraya was present at the press meet.