Police bust job and loan scam, arrest three cybercriminals

A major cybercrime syndicate, including an international kingpin and a call centre operator, was on Saturday busted by the Varanasi cybercrime team in Gautam Buddh Nagar. The gang had been running a sophisticated scam that preyed on job seekers and loan applicants, stealing personal data and duping victims from large sums of money.
During the operation, police seized a range of items, including 13 mobile phones, three laptops, counterfeit stamps, fake appointment letters, ATM cards, and ₹2,450 in cash. The gang had kept records of nearly 10,000 job seekers’ data, with detailed files containing the victims’ information, stated the press release.
According to a press release from the state police, the criminals targeted popular job portals to gather personal information of job seekers. They lured individuals with fake job offers from a non-existent company, Finance 24 Hours. Victims were provided with counterfeit appointment letters and ID cards, then instructed to collect loan applications from their local areas.
Once the victims were involved, the gang demanded various fraudulent charges, including registration fees, RTGS fees, and NOC charges, for loan processing. After the money was transferred into the gang’s bank accounts, they severed all communication, leaving victims helpless.
The scam was uncovered when Brijesh Yadav, a resident of Varanasi, filed a complaint on October 24, 2024, detailing how the gang had scammed him and his friends of ₹5.65 lakh under the guise of offering loans.
Acting swiftly on his complaint, the police registered an FIR (first information report) under multiple sections of Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and Information Technology Act. An investigation team, led by Varanasi ADCP Shruti Shrivastava and ACP Gaurav Kumar traced the gang to Gautam Buddh Nagar and made the arrests, the press release stated.
The arrested suspects were identified as Deepak Bahora, 28, from Nepal, Jitendra Kumar Patel, 32, from Jaunpur, and Manoj Kumar Gupta, 35, from Gorakhpur. They were operating from Noida under multiple fake company names, including RK Associate, Fashion ADDA, Himalaya 24 Hours, and RGI Finance Pvt Ltd.