Chennai: Three Tamil Nadu residents who posed as police personnel Delhi and extorted more than 30 lakh from nearly 1,000 people in the national capital, as a fine because it was not ordered to watch pornographic films, had been arrested.
A cyberrime wing team from the city picked up Ramkumar, 32, from Mangadu, Joseph, 37, from Colathur and Dinochand, 29, from Trichy after tracking their Internet Protocol (IP) address to Triplicane.
“Police Delhi now plans to get a transit warrant before taking them to the city for further investigation,” said Chennai police officer.
Gang members have used the Delhi police logo and started a Google Pay account where they extracted money from the victims.
This problem was revealed after many complainants went to the police when they did not get a receipt for their purchases as promised and the ‘officer’ cellphone number was turned off after payment was made.
A registered casing and the Cyberrime wing squad from Delhi arrived in Chennai and approached TripLicane police with a request to help arrest the suspects found by IP addresses.
After they were picked up, the three were taken to the Triplicane police station and asked.
An officer said the three men also extorted money from people in several parts of Tamil Nadu but the police had not received complaints in this reegard.
Explain the mode of gang operandi in Delhi, the officer said the three men would get the IP address of the victim, contact him and then threaten him.
“He will be told that unless he pays 3,000 cases will slap him because watching a porn.
They will also tell him that he will be produced before a judge in Delhi,” said a police officer.
Researchers, however, are not sure whether the gang targets its people randomly or if you use any software to hack VPN (virtual personal network) which is mostly used while watching pornographic films.