ATM Hackers Quizzed in Tripura, Agartala

Agartala: Tripura police here on Thursday began interrogating two Turkish and two Bangladeshi nationals, who were arrested in West Bengal in November for stealing huge amounts of cash from ATMs by cloning devices installed in Tripura capital Agartala, the police said.

The State Bank of India (SBI), however, started refunding around Rs 50 lakh to their 80 customers, whose money was stolen by the cyber criminals and ATM hackers.

A police official on Thursday said that with the help of West Bengal’s Barrackpore Police Commissionerate, the four foreign cyber criminals – Hakan Zanburkan, Fettah Aldemir, both Turkish Nationals and Mohammad Hannan, Mohammad Rafiqul Islam, the Bangladeshi nationals - were brought here on Wednesday and produced before the Chief Judicial Magistrate court in Agartala on Thursday. The Court sent the four cyber criminals to police custody to be quizzed by officials of Tripura police Cyber crime branch and intelligence officials.

As per the preliminary probe, the Turkish nationals with the help of the Bangladeshi collaborators had taken out lakhs of rupees through the ATM-cloning devices in Guwahati in August and might be the same criminals involved in the similar hacking in Agartala.

According to the police, around 80 bank customers of different banks mostly State Bank of India (SBI) in November last year had lost lakhs of rupees due to the fraudulent acts of the cyber criminals and ATM hackers. SBI’s Regional Manager Dibyendu Chowdhury said that they have received complaints from around 80 customers that they lost their money due to the ATM hacking.

“We have completed the banking process to refund around Rs 50 lakh to those customers whose money was stolen by the cyber criminals and ATM hackers,” Chowdhury told IANS.

He said that the SBI immediately after the incident had also blocked around 10,000 ATM and debit cards of its customers as precautionary measures.

According to a cyber-technology expert, the ATM card cloning system comprises a spy camera, a memory card and a small data device to gather ATM and account details of bank customers. (IANS)

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