Bengaluru, Jan 21 (Express News Service): A man who posed as a secret agent and a pilot to attract young women online has been arrested on charges of cheating by the Bengaluru police.

The tech savvy conman identified as Prateek Mathur, 28, from Mumbai flaunted his fake credentials on social media to attract women and later blackmailed them by accessing intimate pictures, police said.

Mathur posed as Robin Peter, a UK national, who was on a secret mission to India to attract girls, police said. “He created fake ID cards and passport templates, ” DCP Crime, Abhishek Goyal said.

Police began tracking the online prowler after a woman in Bengaluru contacted the JP Nagar police and complained that Prateek had victimized her. “She told us that she met Prateek on a social media platform and he wooed her with his fake identity and the two even went on a vacation to Bangkok. Prateek later began blackmailing the woman with their intimate pictures,” a police official said.

The police laid a trap for Prateek by asking the woman to lure him to Bengaluru by agreeing to pay some of the money he was demanding. The self-styled secret agent fell flew down from Mumbai and went directly to the complainant’s home where he was picked up by policemen in plain clothes.

Prateek Mathur has been booked under various sections of the Indian Penal Code for impersonation and cheating and under the IT Act. Police have claimed to have recovered dozens of private pictures of women whom Prateek is suspected to have been blackmailing.