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Four youngsters from the city have been caught in a
credit card fraud. Two of these were software engineers,
who, wanting to make some quick money commited a frauf
of Rs 3 lakhs.
The foursome were arrested by the Juhu police on Tuesday.
Interestingly, one of the boys was all set to leave
for the United States for a job in a wellplaced computer
firm.
This crime was masterminded by the leader of this
gang, 19-year-old Leo Paul. A second-year engineering
student at a Bandra college, Paul had read about a magnetic
card-reading device which could store data once a card
was swiped through it.
Data from as many as 12 such credit cards could be
stored at a time. Paul then allegedly teamed up with
Akash Kamble, a 19-year-old resident of Lokhandwala
complex, Andheri, and they ordered the card-reader from
the United States, using the internet, since it’s
not available in India.
"The boys befriended a waiter at Kings International
hotel at Juhu to take their plan ahead. Every time someone
ate a meal in the hotel and paid by credit card, the
waiter would discreetly swipe it through the magnetic
card-reader, which is no more than 6-inches long and
can be stored in the pocket," said investigating
officer Ramesh Nangare.
Once the waiter's role was over, he would hand over
the device to Paul who would download the data from
the cards on to Kamble’s personal computer.
The duo would then feed the data into blank cards,
available in the grey market. The cards were now ready
to be used in shopping malls and theatres, or to withdraw
money from an ATM.
Senior inspector Pradeep Shinde said that the boys
forged information from more than 22 cards in this manner.
The fraud was exposed after officials from HSBC bank
complained to the police.
The cops got in touch with customers whose cards had
been duplicated and discovered they had all visited
Hotel Kings International and paid by credit card.
Investigators then apprehended the waiter who led
them to the four youngsters. Paul, Kamble and the two
other collegians identified as Manoj Chauhan (24) and
Mahesh Valani (20), have all been remanded to police
custody.
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