The Enforcement Directorate has arrested an accused in connection with a large-scale “illegal” call-centre scam operating from the surrounding areas of Delhi, and targeting U.S. nationals.
According to the ED findings, from November 2022 to April 2024, the syndicate had cheated victims of about $15 million. Assets worth more than ₹100 crore bought by the masterminds using the ill-gotten money have been identified by the agency.
The arrested accused has been identified as Chandra Prakash Gupta. He was arrested under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act.
A key accused in the tech-support fraud cases, involving impersonation of technical service providers, Mr. Gupta had been absconding since July 2024 after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) conducted searches. A court issued a non-bailable warrant against him.
The agency has initiated the money-laundering investigation on the basis of a case registered by the CBI.
On December 19-20, the ED conducted searches at 10 locations related to the masterminds and associates of the scam. The searches resulted in the seizure of jewelry worth about ₹1.75 crore, over ₹10 lakh in cash, four high-end vehicles, eight luxury watches, digital devices, and documents.
“However, key accused persons Arjun Gulati, Abhinav Kalra, and Divyansh Goel, remain absconding,” said the agency.
During the searches, over 220 bottles of expensive liquor, far exceeding the permissible residential limit, were also impounded from multiple premises. The matter was reported to the State Excise Department, and cases were registered as per law.
“So far, the investigation has revealed that illegal call-centres were operated from Noida and Gurugram, where employees defrauded US nationals. The fraudulent activities were carried out through deceptive pop-up alert messages designed to closely resemble official Microsoft security notifications,” the ED said.
The pop-ups misled the prospective victims into calling phone numbers displayed on screens of their medical devices, where they were connected to the accused persons operating the illegal call centres.
“By using sophisticated technical systems, the accused impersonated Microsoft technical support and persuaded victims to install remote access software such as TeamViewer or AnyDesk, thereby gaining complete control over their computer systems. Once access was obtained, the accused navigated the victims’ devices and extracted sensitive personal and financial information, including online banking details,” said the agency.
Exploiting the victims’ fear and confusion, the accused made them transfer funds from their personal bank accounts via wire transfers to the accounts falsely represented as being controlled by the Federal Reserve, on the pretext of protecting the money from imminent hacking threats.
The funds were wire-transferred to bank accounts in Hong Kong, converted into cryptocurrencies, later liquidated into fiat currency, and then layered back into the accounts of the accused and their companies through multiple shell entities with the assistance of various operators.