Mumbai Crime: 4 held in Andheri for cloning cards to steal from bank accounts

The arrested accused. Pic courtesy/ Vishal Singh

Four people were arrested by the Unit 9 of Mumbai Crime Branch from Andheri on Friday for cloning debit cards and withdrawing money from bank accounts.

The accused were identified as Yashwant Gupta alias Sonu, Azharuddin Ansari, Istiak Khan and Mohammad Faiz Chaudhary.

A deputy manager (Risk, Intelligence and Control) of HDFC Bank's corporate branch had complained that money was being withdrawn from the accounts of several account holders without them receiving any OTP.

After receiving the complaint, the Crime Branch investigated and found that a cloned card was being used in a hotel in Andheri. When the police went there and inspected the CCTV footage, it was found that Gupta, a former manager of the hotel, was using the card. During investigation, it was also found that the accused frequented the hotel.

As per their modus operandi, when a hotel customer swiped his card on the machine for payment, its details were stored in the device. Gupta also used to see the customer's password and used this info to clone the card and make withdrawals.

A skimmer, 9 magnetic strip cards, 7 debit cards, 3 mobile phones and some cash were recovered from the accused.

"When the hotel manager Yashwant Gupta used to take the machine on his own, he would see the password and remember the payment time. He used this info to make withdrawals," said Nandkumar Gopale, senior police inspector, Unit 9.