Cyber frauds & money mules: The dangers of loaning your bank account | Ep 112

[00:00:00] With the advance of internet connectivity and widespread use of digital devices, the

[00:00:07] age-old form of theft and deception has now transcended into a sophisticated realm of digital

[00:00:14] manipulation and exploitation.

[00:00:18] From simple fishing scams to complex ransomware attacks and identity theft, the evolution

[00:00:24] of cyber fraud has blurred the lines between the virtual and physical worlds.

[00:00:30] Recently, fraudsters have come up with something called the money mule scam to target unsuspecting

[00:00:37] individuals and coerce them into loaning their bank accounts for fraudulent transactions.

[00:00:44] What may seem like a simple favour or a seemingly legitimate opportunity to secure a nominal

[00:00:51] commission then turns into a nightmare of financial entanglement and legal repercussions?

[00:01:28] First, George Preagale, Onmanorama's senior correspondent, joins us to share with us a

[00:01:33] gist of his recent story on how two college students from Kerala who loaned their bank

[00:01:40] accounts to strangers landed up in the Punjab Central Jail for no fault of theirs.

[00:01:46] Later in this podcast we are also joined by Dr. Dhania Menon, India's first women's

[00:01:51] cyber crime investigator to discuss the subject in depth.

[00:01:57] George, could you give us a small summary of this case which you have investigated in depth?

[00:02:03] Sometimes in August last year two college students were picked up by the Punjab police.

[00:02:10] They were accused of scamming a doctor in Mahaali.

[00:02:14] The doctor lost around 51 lakhs to an online fraud but these students were not related

[00:02:21] to any fraud and they were arrested and taken to Punjab but they tried to get bail several

[00:02:31] times like two times in the lower court and another two times in the high court.

[00:02:36] But both the judges rejected their bail saying that they are part of a big nexus and they

[00:02:42] cannot be granted bail because this online fraud is too prevalent in the country and

[00:02:48] they are at a risk, it's a risk to send them out in the open and that's when I came to

[00:02:54] know about this case how these college students are in jail for more than nine months now.

[00:03:02] So when I started digging in the story I found out that they were not related to this online

[00:03:07] scam but they were just allowing their accounts to be used by some other persons to receive

[00:03:14] money. So they got entangled in this online fraud because they gave this account to their

[00:03:22] friend.

[00:03:23] Okay, so did they do it for a commission or they just trusted a friend and they handed

[00:03:27] over the account details to them?

[00:03:30] So there are two aspects to this. There are people who actually leave their accounts,

[00:03:38] rent out their accounts for a small fee around 10,000 to 20,000 to 25,000 that's the

[00:03:43] range in which most of these accounts are given to unknown people or even when they do it for

[00:03:51] their friends they often give it for free or for convenience to receive money. When their

[00:03:56] account, they don't have an account or their accounts are blocked, they give it to their

[00:04:00] friend. In that case they don't charge money but once the accounting creditors,

[00:04:05] login creditors are given to a third party, the third party can sell it to many other

[00:04:11] people.

[00:04:13] Now over to Dr. Dhania Men. So Dr. Dhania, you've been in the field of cyber crime investigation

[00:04:18] for the past 20 years. Could you tell us a bit about how cyber fraudsters trap these

[00:04:25] youngsters into loaning their bank accounts?

[00:04:28] See basically this trend started off a little earlier I wouldn't say it just came up

[00:04:34] now where the accounts that were dominant in the banks were used for certain purposes

[00:04:43] with the knowledge of the people who are working in the bank as well. So this was

[00:04:50] probably a very few in number cases and the execution of this particular thing was

[00:04:58] a little more silent and very, very the damage was on a very large amount but the

[00:05:03] impact on the people were on the numbers were few. It wouldn't impact mass audience

[00:05:12] as such but now with the advent of this online banking and reaching out from

[00:05:18] anywhere to anywhere and things like that the impact very aptly as you called it

[00:05:25] pyramid the lower level is really vast. So this what happens is that anybody who has

[00:05:33] a dominant account or who is looking out for quick money and that is where the

[00:05:38] youngsters of today fall prey actually because for them when there is a lack of

[00:05:46] employability I would use the word lack of employability only and I'm very

[00:05:51] choosing with the words that I use because the right word for as far as my

[00:05:56] opinion is that the youth of today are not employable it is not that this scarcity

[00:06:03] of employment to that extent that we see today there is employment at certain

[00:06:09] stage and there are resources as in manpower resources at some stage but

[00:06:16] there's no bridging. The youths today who are ready to work or who are not

[00:06:23] employed cannot fit into the jobs that are available today so there is a lack of

[00:06:28] employability there and because of this there's a lot of you know look the youth

[00:06:33] looking forward to make quick money to satisfy their purchase and the youngsters

[00:06:39] today I think that they are also competing with the upper generation you

[00:06:43] know where their parents what they did at 40 they want to do it in their 20s the

[00:06:48] competition is at two different levels IP so they are also looking out for easy

[00:06:53] money where and you know they feel they give up all they're doing is what they

[00:06:57] just learning out there accounts or probably they open a new account which

[00:07:04] they don't have a transaction with and they just give it out and they make

[00:07:08] money and the money is not all that small to the IP have seen transactions where

[00:07:14] the loan and are the rent are given on a bank account is close to around 70,000

[00:07:19] rupees a month. So for a 20 year old to get a 70,000 rupees a month for just

[00:07:25] giving out the bank details and the checkbook to them or the ATM card of

[00:07:29] the net banking aid pin to them obviously that is not his money right

[00:07:38] because they're not aware of the risk associated to it as well. So we have seen

[00:07:43] cases like this empty number of cases coming up like this but there is also

[00:07:48] an understanding from the investigations that we have made in our office from

[00:07:52] the studies that we've made in our office that this is not actually

[00:07:56] possible without the knowledge of the bankers. So if I go to open a current

[00:08:01] account in a bank I have to furnish so many documents so there has to be

[00:08:06] some kind of an information within the bank as well and we have seen

[00:08:10] evidences to our studies where we've seen media reports of bank officials

[00:08:16] being arrested because they have actually opened such accounts in their

[00:08:21] banks as well and they're also youngsters. They're not like I think the

[00:08:26] latest errors that happened in Delhi from I don't remember the bank I

[00:08:32] think it was Kota or something and the officers who were arrested were from

[00:08:36] the age group of 24 to 28. So even they are youngsters.

[00:08:42] So how do these fraudsters actually approach the youngsters?

[00:08:47] You know I've heard that telegram links are one way. What are the

[00:08:52] different modes by which they are approached?

[00:08:57] See it's basically advertisements on social media it is just the telegram

[00:09:01] is one app where there is a lot of transaction that happens which is not

[00:09:06] recorded or which goes unrecorded and unnoticed for a long time.

[00:09:11] But see basically you can also look at so many other social media

[00:09:16] advertisements that I've had issues where these advertisements

[00:09:20] come upon certain chat groups on WhatsApp as well where they say

[00:09:26] work from home, earn quick money, work on social media and get some

[00:09:30] money. So these are anybody who clicks on such advertisements or who spends

[00:09:35] time on such advertisements or follows the link of such advertisements.

[00:09:40] They're all probable targets.

[00:09:42] Correct. So you were earlier speaking about the private banks how they can

[00:09:48] also be a party to this and it's not possible without their knowledge

[00:09:52] beyond a certain extent. So our reporter while he was investigating

[00:09:56] the matter spoke to a private bank manager and he said that several

[00:10:00] youngsters do approach the banks to open new accounts to help

[00:10:04] you know in this little team. So is this true and if so how can banks

[00:10:09] actually initiate something to help control these transactions and

[00:10:13] prevent it at the beginning stage itself?

[00:10:17] See basically when you go to open even a small account you have

[00:10:21] to abide by a lot of regulations.

[00:10:24] Correct. So every account is the only thing that probably you can

[00:10:27] account open an account with a bank but still there you need somebody

[00:10:30] to introduce you. So there is an accountability that follows

[00:10:36] and if there is a bank in definitely it comes to their

[00:10:41] knowledge they can definitely report the same they can monitor

[00:10:45] the such accounts and they can also their logs will have the back

[00:10:55] transaction logs to be saved for further investigations.

[00:11:01] See where we have been stuck in most of the cases that banks don't

[00:11:03] respond to us with the data.

[00:11:07] Even if we go back to them and tell them that you know this

[00:11:10] amount has been transferred to the current accounts numbers

[00:11:13] and so please give us the address of that particular office or the

[00:11:18] address group or the even if we say if I live with RTI they don't

[00:11:22] give it to us. Okay where our private agency we don't but

[00:11:25] police is also majorly stuck with such agencies.

[00:11:29] Understood. So is there any mechanism by which these

[00:11:33] dormant accounts if they're suddenly active that you know

[00:11:36] there is an alert system which goes and you know they can

[00:11:40] look at it like and where the funds are coming from and you know

[00:11:43] maybe monitor so that would you know also help it right.

[00:11:48] See you think our accounts are not being monitored by the banks

[00:11:53] if there is a huge transaction in my account the manager or my

[00:11:58] relationship officer will immediately call me and say see

[00:12:02] if you have any surplus funds park it with us on FDs or RDS.

[00:12:07] Correct. Okay because they know it so the mechanism is always there

[00:12:13] but they're choosing not to monitor it or you know report it that's the problem right.

[00:12:19] I think they are choosing not to monitor it and absolutely

[00:12:23] choosing not to report it one thing second thing is that what I'm saying is if certain banks

[00:12:28] do not have such a facility it is not rocket science to improvise their

[00:12:36] IT mechanism as well.

[00:12:39] Right so now you know most of these arrests which are based on the money trail

[00:12:45] ends up catching the intermediaries now there were like two Malapuram youths who were arrested

[00:12:51] for a large transaction which was you know transferred to their bank accounts.

[00:12:55] So why is it that only these intermediaries are trapped and why is it so difficult to

[00:13:00] trace that end point? See intermediaries are always easier to target because if I'm the complainant

[00:13:09] and I had loaned out the account to you or probably I got the money and I transferred it to 10 other

[00:13:16] people the reach out is much more easier. Okay one step backwards and forwards is much more

[00:13:23] easier now imagine this has to go about 20 steps and then you lose all respect to the

[00:13:29] geographical jurisdictions available if you ask the police to go and investigate in Maharashtra

[00:13:34] they need permissions in Maharashtra within this I mean interstate permissions are required.

[00:13:41] So an integration is you know very crucial when it comes to cyber investigation right?

[00:13:46] Absolutely absolutely whenever we are talking about a cyber crime see cyber space doesn't pay any

[00:13:52] respect to the geographical jurisdiction and we're talking about the law being tied down by

[00:13:59] geographical jurisdiction then the next question is who bears the cost? So people who come to

[00:14:05] ask even for a primary study so that they can go back to the police and lodge a complaint

[00:14:12] the thing is they've already lost so much money who funds us.

[00:14:16] So ma'am if you have to trace all these elements now you've been an investigator

[00:14:21] for quite some time what would your recommendations be and you know how do you think we can actually

[00:14:27] you know reach to the top end of the pyramid? You can reduce the impact of it the top of

[00:14:34] the pyramid is they will not even start such a thing if there is integration among the

[00:14:38] bands and the police infrastructure the investigative infrastructure that links up

[00:14:45] very well then they will not they see to reach out to the top of the pyramid you will

[00:14:50] we will not have to reach out to the top of the pyramid because there will not be a pyramid at all

[00:14:54] they will not start at all. So first thing definitely would be that we have a technical

[00:15:00] and a legal you know coordination between the nation at least within the nation if not

[00:15:06] ask I mean if not intra country but at least within the nation we should definitely have this

[00:15:12] coordination and of course the banks would also be you know monitored and they should also have

[00:15:20] certain checks in place where these things won't happen now I feel you know after any kind of a

[00:15:26] business person to move up business in India is much more difficult it's much easier to do any

[00:15:30] fraudulent actions. To open a bank account is very difficult for a normal person it's very

[00:15:37] difficult to open a bank account to get a transaction properly dealt with to file an issue with the bank

[00:15:47] is very difficult even today even spite of the banks gearing up and saying that yes we have

[00:15:52] ourselves our customer service cell we have a ruder cell etc etc for the customers to reach

[00:15:58] out to them is really difficult and there is no awareness there is absolutely no awareness

[00:16:05] among the civilians who use these facilities because most of them don't even know what number

[00:16:12] they should reach out to for their own bank and they google the SEO is done and some fraudulent

[00:16:20] number comes up on the job we have seen empty number of cases like that also where the

[00:16:24] customer calls at the customer service number of the bank which they google and they get a

[00:16:30] call back from a fraudulent agency agency right so where is the infrastructure heading to

[00:16:41] banking infrastructure as well most of the time these helpline numbers or customer service

[00:16:47] numbers do not function ma'am so there is an complaint as well that our cyber team from the

[00:16:56] police is not often equipped to handle such crimes and you know they don't go in in depth

[00:17:00] because there are first of all there are hundreds of cases which are being raised every day so I think

[00:17:07] even they are you know loaded with lot of cases but then in most of the cases they don't go beyond

[00:17:13] a certain point to investigate into what is actually happening they just find some criminals

[00:17:19] or you know some people and then they just lock them up and they don't go towards the end

[00:17:25] so is this true and is there a sort of education which is required amongst the cyber crime cells

[00:17:32] within the country have you often felt that during your investigation

[00:17:38] see I would say that is bridged to a large extent because there are

[00:17:44] officers who are personally interested or personally vested in this particular topic at

[00:17:48] the moment who want to look at this particular career as in a futuristic dimension

[00:17:54] so there are people I see again the police infrastructure when you talk about it also

[00:17:59] they're also human beings so when there is lack of awareness in the civilians there is lack of

[00:18:03] awareness in the police infrastructure as well but the major thing I would say would be that

[00:18:08] you know the number of cases that we deal with today are much much more than what the

[00:18:13] infrastructure can handle and especially when you're talking about the infrastructure needs

[00:18:19] to handle such issues without any kind of a cooperation like this where there's no

[00:18:23] system laid out where there's no pattern laid out where there's no procedure laid out it becomes

[00:18:28] very difficult for them okay now moving on let's talk about cryptocurrency so there is a mysterious

[00:18:35] aspect attached to cryptocurrency and I think this is often used by fraudsters to hide their

[00:18:41] footprints right what have you observed in your experience are these often used or

[00:18:47] or are there other means which are used to you know hide activities

[00:18:53] so there are a multi number of reasons given to hide activities like you know I know from

[00:18:58] from the time I got into this field we have been getting emails saying that somebody died with

[00:19:04] a huge asset that is left behind and I am their attorney or I am their banker who want to

[00:19:09] offload this money yesterday also we got such a complex such an issue where somebody had

[00:19:14] followed up such a mail and they lost about 20 lakhs okay so from 20 years onwards I'm seeing

[00:19:21] these cases these stories being repeated so cryptocurrency or bitcoin is again something

[00:19:28] which probably some people do not know that they follow about it follow up on this okay so

[00:19:37] I definitely think there needs to be a real good education and a good kind of an awareness

[00:19:42] given at least to the next generation okay so if you were to outline a few points how do

[00:19:49] individuals prevent themselves from falling prey to such frauds first thing is that ask questions

[00:19:57] when you see something somebody is not dead living and make their to make our life beautiful no

[00:20:04] there are no free lunches so I think it really needs to get into the

[00:20:09] DNA of human beings to understand that there are no free lunches and there is nothing that somebody

[00:20:16] will give us for you of course there is a cost always so whenever you see some kind of unrealistic

[00:20:22] figures when you when you see some kind of unrealistic profits understand they're under

[00:20:28] it is not possible that's all so where we really need to understand every human being

[00:20:33] deals with this space needs to understand anything that is possible offline is possible online

[00:20:39] in a larger or in a very large dimension so that's one thing second thing is if you feel

[00:20:47] something you see something study about it read about it or ask people about it see I have had

[00:20:54] cases where people come and say um I want a vmw car by lottery and I want to get the car down

[00:21:02] so they asked us for processing fee uh so we sent the processing fee now they're asking for

[00:21:07] additional money so can you check out the documents that they sent and when we tell them

[00:21:13] that you know this is not true we've also had instances where they go back and talk to their

[00:21:17] people and say that you know we are jealous that they won the lottery or they won this

[00:21:21] particular price right how unrealistic can human beings be I don't know

[00:21:27] so that that needs to be I mean people need to be on guard it's your money harder and money you have

[00:21:33] to be on guard all right so now over to the next step with that I think we can wind up the podcast

[00:21:40] if you are calling free to you know such uh nefarious activities what do you do like who

[00:21:46] do you approach what would be the first step or the first step would be to definitely save all

[00:21:52] the transaction evidences see in case where your gadget has been um infected by some kind of a malware

[00:22:00] or a spyware we have seen issues cases where the uh criminal party actually has access to your

[00:22:07] gadget and they delete all kinds of evidences as well the sms's the messages that they sent

[00:22:12] the conversation they had everything they were able to delete so as and when possible when you

[00:22:17] get into something please take screenshots and save some data in some other gadget as well so that

[00:22:23] you know you don't lose evidence we can't create anything from point blank so that is one thing

[00:22:30] second is report for any kind of a financial uh frauds uh india we do have a portal called cybercrime

[00:22:38] dot jov dot in we also have a number called 1930 please report on them in case you have any

[00:22:46] difficulty talk to experts talk to professionals they may be lawyers they may be uh technocrats

[00:22:53] or whatever but talk to experts on how to save such evidences and how to report such things but

[00:22:59] report okay so i think uh with that i think we can wind up uh today's episode thank you so much

[00:23:06] uh dr danya menon for joining us uh that is a wrap for today's episode of on manoramas news break

[00:23:11] an explainer podcast which is produced by harita benjamin with technical production by idea brew

[00:23:16] studios it comes out every week and is available on all podcast platforms do follow on manorama.com

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