FIA arrests key member of bank account hackers' team

GUJRANWALA: The cyber crime wing of Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on Tuesday arrested a key gang member of hackers’ team involved in telephone banking fraud. 

The arrest is deemed as a major breakthrough in the case as innocent people are being stripped off their money, almost on daily basis, by falling prey to the banking fraud done through phone calls.

As per the Assistant Director FIA, the culprit, Shabbir, was taken into custody from Hafizabad on a tip of another suspect, Shafiq, who was earlier arrested on September 28 by the agency.

With the arrest of these two members of hacker’s gang, important information was collected regarding the whereabouts of their team, the FIA official said, adding that more arrests are expected from different areas of Punjab in near future.

Merely a day earlier, two more cases of hacking of bank account surfaced in Punjab and hackers deprived a teacher and a local person of their life savings.

According to the details, hackers withdrew over Rs0.3.2 million from two bank accounts in Pakpattan and Bahawalnagar.

In the latest cyber attack, a group of hackers siphoned off Rs0.2 million from the bank account of a school teacher in Pakpattan.

The teacher, Abdul Ghafar said his money was transferred in no time, soon after he provided details about his bank account to a man, who pretended to be calling from the bank for the investigation purpose.

The teacher said the fraudsters deprived him of his five years’ savings and added that the bank officials refused to compensate him.

In another bank fraud, hackers withdrew more than Rs0.12 million from a bank account of a citizen in Bahawalnagar. The affectee said he deposited the money in a bank for his brother’s marriage.