Solving Crime: How a trial version VPN helped Mumbai cops trace student who sent 5 threat emails to Mukesh Ambani

A Mumbai police officer said that the 21-year-old whose demands started from Rs 20 crore to Rs 400 crore and signed off his emails with ‘Catch me if you can’ was surprised to see the police at his doorstep as he was confident he had masked his identity.

Khant had created an account on an email service provider that is not available in India using a VPN where one can select any country’s IP address. The encrypted mail service is known not to provide account details to law enforcement agencies. He created an account in the name of ‘Shadab Khan’, reportedly while watching a Pakistan vs South Africa match where Pakistani bowler Shadab Khan was bowling, according to the police.

Khant believed that by masking his IP address using a VPN and a mail service where getting data is difficult, he would not be traced, the police said.

However, his decision to use a trial version of a VPN proved costly. While law enforcement agencies are equipped with enough technical resources to trace people masking their IP address using VPN, in this case, Khant made their job easier by using a trial version.

To prompt him to purchase the VPN, the VPN service provider took off its network – thereby exposing Khant’s actual IP address.

“It was just a ping to a service provider before the VPN network came off for a short time that helped us get his location to Kalol in Gujarat. It was based on this that we were able to track him down,” the officer said.

“When we reached his house, he was shocked. He could not believe how we reached him. We believe he just sent these emails to show off how technically proficient he was,” the officer added.