Disguised as villagers, a team from Pune's Cyber police station arrested from a remote village in Bihar's Siwan district two key suspects in a 'whale phishing' cyber attack, in which a well-known Pune-based real estate development company had lost Rs 66 lakh to online fraudsters in May. Posing as the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the company, the cyber fraudsters had sent messages to the Accounting Vice President of the firm directing her to make three large transfers to fraudulent accounts in a span of less than two hours. A First Information Report in the case was registered on May 18 by the 50-year-old Accounting VP of the company, on whose official phone number the fraudulent messages were sent on the afternoon of May 8. The Accounting VP received a message from an unidentified number in which the sender had identified himself as the CEO of the company. The message said that the number was his “very personal number” and that it should not be shared with anyone. The message further said that he was in a meeting and would not like to be disturbed. The message instructed the VP to make a transfer of Rs 9.8 lakh to a bank account. Trusting the message, the VP asked her staffer to make the payment. Over the next two hours, two messages were received on the VP's official phone directing her to make transfers of Rs 35.9 lakh and Rs 20.7 lakh. Both transfers were made immediately. However, while these transfers were being made, the VP kept calling the number and kept getting the reply 'Don't call.' The complainant checked the said phone number on an online caller identification application, and had the name and photo of the CEO. A while later, the complainant checked with the Personal Assistant of the CEO and then connected with the CEO himself to find out that no such instructions had been given by him. Meanwhile more messages seeking further fund transfers had been received but were not responded to because it had become clear that the company had been cheated by cyber fraudsters. A probe was launched by a team from the Cyber crime police station. In the first week of September, getting the first breakthrough in the case, following the probe into various technical leads and information of the bank accounts used by the cyber criminals, a suspect identified as Bishal Kumar Bharat Manjhi (23), who hails from Siwan in Bihar, was arrested. Probe revealed that Manjhi had received a portion of the funds that were transferred to three fraudulent accounts. Some amount was also withdrawn as cash from this account. Working on more leads obtained in the investigation, the team from cyber crime police station zeroed in on two more suspects from a small settlement of 150 houses in Lakri Dargah area of Barharia taluka of Siwan district. A team comprising a sub inspector and five constables from the cyber crime cell camped in the village for one and half days guised as villagers from the same area and gathering intel about the whereabouts of the suspects. On October 5, the team finally nabbed the two suspects identified as Belal Ansari (21) and Kamran Ansari (23). Probe has revealed their role in managing the fraudulent bank accounts and also withdrawing a portion of the swindled amount in cash. The police team secured the transit remand of the duo and brought them to Pune where they have been remanded to police custody till Friday. Pune and Pimpri Chinchwad police had till September registered half a dozen cases in which the cyber attackers posing as company CEOs manipulated senior officials into transferring large funds to fraudulent accounts. The scams are known as 'spear phishing' or 'whale phishing' attacks - because they target the big fish in the company or more commonly known as 'CEO scams.' Officials said that two more such cases have been reported in Pune in October in which two real estate companies have been duped to the tune of Rs 40 lakhs each. The probe in the case was done under supervision of DCP Srinivas Ghadge and ACP RN Raje by a team comprising Senior Inspector Minal Patil, Inspector Chandrasekhar Sawant, PSI Pramod Kharat, PSI Sandesh Karne, police Constables Dattatray Fulsundar, Ashwin Kumkar, Pravinsing Rajput, Vaibhav Mane, Dinesh Markad, Shirish Gaikwad, Rajesh Kedari, and Yogesh Waval.
