SIM-swap scam: Rohini woman loses over Rs 48k; two from Burari held

New Delhi: A case of SIM-swapping fraud has surfaced in Rohini after a woman's mobile number was fraudulently ported, enabling unauthorised credit-card transactions. Police have arrested two men in the case. The complaint was filed by a resident of Sector-6, Rohini, who discovered that three unauthorised transactions — Rs 2,627, Rs 20,550 and Rs 25,687 — had been made on her credit card on Jan 30. She later learnt that her mobile number and her son's number had been deactivated a few days earlier.
Police said the fraud began on Jan 22, when the woman was returning to Delhi from Kanpur after a religious function. During the journey, she and her son met a man who identified himself as Sachin Gupta from Burari and was accompanied by a young woman posing as his sister-in-law. The two allegedly gained the victims' trust and took their phones briefly on the pretext of making a call. "The accused used that brief access to generate SIM-porting requests, obtain UPC codes and delete confirmation messages. On Jan 24, two new SIM cards linked to the victims' numbers were issued in another name after being ported to another telecom operator," said additional commissioner of police (Rohini) Rajeev Ranjan. Once the SIM was activated, the accused allegedly accessed banking and financial apps linked to the number. According to police, the number was registered with a credit card on an app that enabled OTP-based authentication. After first attempting a small payment of Rs 2,627, the accused transferred Rs 20,550 to one bank account and Rs 25,687 to another. Following technical analysis and tracking the money trail, the cyber police arrested Sachin Kumar Gupta, 26, and his brother Nitin Kumar Gupta, 23, from Nathupura, Burari. A mobile phone and an ATM card used in the crime were recovered. Further investigation is underway.