Stockbroker in net in bank data theft case

Pune: The city police’s cybercrime unit on Sunday arrested a stockbroker in the case of the alleged theft of pan-India sensitive data of corporate account holders in private banks and trading the information with buyers with an intent to siphon off funds.

The number of people arrested in the case went up to 14 following the arrest of Sudhir Bhatewara, alias Jain (54), a resident of Sinhagad Road, on Sunday night. Deputy commissioner of police (cyber) Bhagyashri Navatake said, “Jain was produced before a court on Monday afternoon and remanded in police custody till March 23.”

She said, “The 13 people arrested earlier in the case were also produced in the court on Monday. All of them were sent to magisterial custody. We were questioning Jain for past three days. We arrested him after his role was ascertained.”

The police had raided Jain’s residence on the night intervening March 16 and 17 and seized Rs25 lakh. The amount was collected by the suspects to buy the data from the Hyderabad and Gujarat groups, the police said. Navatake said, “Jain wanted to buy the data for personal gains.”

On Friday, the police had arrested two unemployed men from Hyderabad. Before that, the police had arrested a woman sharebroker from Sinhagad Road, five software engineers from different parts of India, a film producer in the past one week. The techies and other mediators from Hyderabad and Surat wanted to sell the data and Modak, while Jain and others from Pune wanted to buy the information.