Man held in Pindi for massive credit card fraud

FIA says suspect was in contact with fraudsters, hackers in India and other countries

ISLAMABAD: As banks and investigators grapple with increasing technological challenges in keeping bank accounts secure, the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on Friday said that it had arrested a man from Rawalpindi for allegedly defrauding customers of domestic and international banks by stealing their credit card data.



Saqibullah, the investigation agency said, had been arrested during their raid in Rawalpindi on November 27.

FIA officials said that the suspect was in contact with an Indian hacker through the internet and that it was on the latter’s directions that he had taken pictures of various ATM machines in Islamabad and Rawalpindi.

The pictures were then sent to his Indian accomplice to prepare a skimmer.

Investigators found that Saqibullah was also in contact with other hackers and cybercriminals in countries such as Canada, Nigeria, America and Italy from whom he collected the bulk of international credit card data.

He would purchase the stolen credit card data from these overseas hackers and sell them on. He would receive payments through the Western Union money transfer facility by using tampered identity cards of his family members and others.

Officials said the suspect had also tampered the CNICs of his family members and relatives to use counterfeit credit and debit cards at various shopping points.

“He prepared international credit cards using the name of his father or mother, but wrote the stolen credit card information of someone else to use them for online shopping,” officials said, adding that they had found 20 blank PVC cards, a magnetic strip reader, a skimmer and two credit cards from his possession.



Officials said the suspect had also fraudulently recorded videos of several women during sexual intercourse and was allegedly blackmailing them. The suspect is currently in FIA’s custody and is being investigated.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 9^th, 2017.