Case 1: First conviction in India A complaint was filed in by Sony India Private Ltd, which runs a website called

sony-sambandh.com, targeting Non Resident Indians. The website enables NRIs to send Sony products to their friends and relatives in India after they pay for it online. The company undertakes to deliver the products to the concerned recipients. In May 2002, someone logged onto the website under the identity of Barbara Campa and ordered a Sony Colour Television set and a cordless head phone. A lady gave her credit card number for payment and requested that the products be delivered to Arif Azim in Noida. The payment was duly cleared by the credit card agency and the transaction processed. After following the relevant procedures of due diligence and checking, the company delivered the items to Arif Azim. At the time of delivery, the company took digital photographs showing the delivery being accepted by Arif Azim. The transaction closed at that, but after one and a half months the credit card agency informed the company that this was an unauthorized transaction as the real owner had denied having made the purchase. The company lodged a complaint for online cheating at the Central Bureau of Investigation which registered a case under Section 418, 419 and 420 of the Indian Penal Code. The matter was investigated into and Arif Azim was arrested. Investigations revealed that Arif Azim, while working at a call centre in Noida gained access to the credit card number of an American national which he misused on the companys site. The CBI recovered the colour television and the cordless head phone. The accused admitted his guilt and the court of Shri Gulshan Kumar Metropolitan Magistrate, New Delhi, convicted Arif Azim under Section 418, 419 and 420 of the Indian Penal Code this being the first time that a cyber crime has been convicted. The court, however, felt that as the accused was a young boy of 24 years and a first-time convict, a lenient view needed to be taken. The court therefore released the accused on probation for one year.

Case 7: Two Nigerians sentenced 7 years RI for online fraud A local court in Malappuram district in Kerala sentenced two Nigerians to five years rigorous imprisonment on July 20, 2011 in a cyber-crime case. The two had cheated a doctor in the district of Rs. 30 lakh about two years ago. Johnson Nwanonyi(32) and Michel Obiorahmuozboa (34), both hailing from Anambra state in Nigeria, were sentenced each under sections 420(cheating)-5 years, and 468(forgery)-5 years of IPC and section 66(D) (phishing) of Information Technology (Amendment) Act 2008 -2 years and a fine of Rs 1.25 lakh by a Chief Judicial Magistrate V Dileep in Manjeri in Malappuram district. The sentence would run concurrently. According to the charges filed by the Karipur police, the duo had cheated the doctor Dr C C Thomas, hailing from Valluvambram in Malappuram district after they sent an e-mail inviting application to recover a huge sum of unclaimed money left behind by a Nigerian businessman. They had advertised that the money, kept aside for charitable hospital, was lying unclaimed in a bank. When the doctor responded to the e-mail, they tricked him by asking to pay Rs 30 lakh as processing fee. But a planned move by the police and the doctor succeeded when the Nigerians were lured into Kerala in March 2010. They were then arrested by the Karipur police. The strong evidence based on which the prosecution presented the case became crucial in the first verdict against financial fraud under the IT Act. Deputy Director for Prosecution V C Ismayil appeared for the prosecution.

CBI-FBI team nabs IIT engineer for software theft Accused remanded to CBI custody Case: In August 2002, Shekhar Verma, an IIT Kharagpur graduate and a former employee of software firm Geometric Software Solutions Ltd, GSSL, was caught red-handed trying to sell a data source code. The source code was the property of GSSLs American client Solid works. The employee had demanded a price of $240,000 for the code. Action Taken: The US firm (Solid Concepts), which was offered the source code by Verma, had got suspicious, and had informed Solid works and GSSL. In turn, Solid works and GSSL got in touch with the Central Bureau of Investigation, CBI, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, FBI. Accused remanded to CBI custody Following it, the CBI and FBI laid a trap for Verma, and arrested him for attempting to sell the code under Sections 379 (theft) and 406 (criminal breach of trust) of the Indian Penal Code and the Information Technology Act. The accused was produced before a designated court in New Delhi, which remanded him to four days of CBI custody. The CBI recovered all copies of the Solid works source codes in Vermas possession, and verified that Verma had not previously provided it to any other party.

SMS Scam Accused arrested by police Case: Two Nadar brothers along with their friend Ramesh Gala, took help of SMS technology and launched the first of its kind SMS fraud in India. They launched a campaign in print media & also put up a website (www.getpaid4sms.com) wherein subscribers were asked to pay deposit of INR 500 and they receive 10 SMS every day against it. The customers were promised handsome commissions if they managed to rope in more subscribers by forwarding the messages. They told their customers that they were working for a US based company called Aropis Advertising Company which wanted to conduct a market survey about local response to their advertisement and were using SMS as it was the latest means of communication. Initially small amounts were paid but when large amounts of cheques began to get dishonoured the customers started to worry. On November 30, one of the duped agents approached the DN Road police station and lodged a complaint after a bank failed to honour a pay order amounting Rs.2.17 million issued by the Nadar brothers. A case was registered with the DN Nagar Police station & later transferred to Economic Offences Wing (EOW). Action Taken: By December 2006 the scam had membership of 50,000 customers in Mumbai alone. The Police suspected that hundreds of thousands from across the country were also hooked to the scheme, thanks to a massive agent network and a door-to-door campaign carried out by the firm's now duped agents.

 During investigations, the EOW came to know that the Nadars, residents of the upmarket Juhu-Tara Road, owned a fleet of imported sport utility vehicles and Sedans. Jayanand Nadar, 30, and Ramesh Gala, 26, were arrested from a hotel in Mira Road in the western suburbs. Nadar, a first year college dropout, along with his brother Jayaraj had allegedly duped at least 50,000 people of Rs.400 million, said officials in the city police's EOW.

ONLINE CREDIT CARD FRAUD ON E-BAY Bhubaneswar: Rourkela police busted a racket involving an online fraud worth Rs 12.5 lakh. The modus operandi of the accused was to hack into the eBay India website and make purchases in the names of credit cardholders. Two persons, including alleged mastermind Debasis Pandit, a BCA student, were arrested and forwarded to the court of the sub divisional judicial magistrate, Rourkela. The other arrested person is Rabi Narayan Sahu. Superintendent of police D.S. Kutty said the duo was later remanded in judicial custody but four other persons allegedly involved in the racket were untraceable. A case has been registered against the accused under Sections 420 and 34 of the Indian Penal Code and Section 66 of the IT Act and further investigation is on, he said. While Pandit, son of a retired employee of Rourkela Steel Plant, was arrested from his Sector VII residence last night, Sahu, his associate and a constable, was nabbed at his house in Uditnagar. Pandit allegedly hacked into the eBay India site and gathered the details of around 700 credit cardholders. He then made purchases by using their passwords. The fraud came to the notice of eBay officials when it was detected that several purchases were made from Rourkela while the customers were based in cities such as Bangalore, Baroda and Jaipur and even London, said V. Naini, deputy manager of eBay. The company brought the matter to the notice of Rourkela police after some customers lodged complaints. Pandit used the address of Sahu for delivery of the purchased goods, said police. The gang was involved in train, flight and hotel reservations. The hand of one Satya Samal, recently arrested inBangalore, is suspected in the crime. Samal had booked a room in a Bangalore hotel for three months. The hotel and transport bills rose to Rs 5 lakh, which he did not pay. Samal was arrested for non-payment of bills, following which Pandit rushed to Bangalore and stood guarantor for his release on bail, police sources said.

TAMIL TIGER CREDIT CARD SCAM SPREADS TO CHENNAI, INDIA The Sri Ramachandra Medical College police at Porur, Chennai, arrested G. Elango, a Tamil Tiger agent carrying a British passport, on Friday and seized 28 ATM cards in his possession. The police said Elango illegally withdrew over Rs. 30 lakh from the ATM centers of a few nationalized banks and a private bank. The amount was then sent to the United Kingdom through unauthorized channels. It is learnt that the Chennai Police was alerted by a civilian who had seen Elango using several ATM cards to withdraw money from an ATM centre of a private bank on Mount-Poonamallee Road, Porur. A police team led by the Assistant Commissioner Police Balasubramaniam caught Elango red-handed while he was withdrawing money from the ATM machine. G. Elango (38) of Middlesex, United Kingdom, is a shareholder in Thamilini a cash and carry grocery shops operated by the Tamil Tigers inUK. Elango is from Valvetiturai, a notorious port for smugglers in the north of Sri Lanka. He is the partner of the LTTEs cash and carry centres of Thamilini in London suburbs one in Croydon and another in Southall. After the arrest Police has found, besides the ATM cards, registration certificate books of two cars, a cellular phone and a passport. Tamil Nadu Police is now seeking the assistance of the Scotland Yard to obtain more information about Elango. The Tamil Tigers are also under investigation in UK for operating credit card rackets in Europe.