The Crime Branch of Ahmedabad Police has arrested three fraudsters who used to buy expensive products online just for a few pennies, sometimes none, by hacking e-commerce websites and changing the items’ original prices, officials said on Friday. The accused committed online fraud with the help of de-bugging security-testing software and ordered around 125 products worth Rs 7 crore just by paying ‘pennies’ and getting them delivered to fake addresses.
The main accused, Adil Parmar, has studied a B.Sc. in Information Technology (IT), while Vijay Vaghela is pursuing an MBA. Both of them were assisted by the third accused, Nitesh alias Chhotu Madta.
Two days ago, the police carried out a raid after receiving information about three people involved in an online casino and betting, and arrested them.
During interrogation, the police discovered that the trio had hacked targeted e-commerce platforms, online casinos, and betting websites. They manipulated the payment gateway process to receive high-value items like mobile phones, drones, computers, laptops, routers, hard disks, gold coins, and jewellery, Ahmedabad City Crime Branch DCP Ajit Rajian said.
Some bank employees have also been summoned for questioning over their suspected involvement in the scam.
The accused purchased high-value items for just a few rupees-or even for free-and later sold them at 80% of their original price, making a 100% profit, Raijian said.
The Ahmedabad Crime Branch has seized mobile phones, laptops, Wi-Fi routers, hard disks, gold coins, jewellery, and other items worth Rs 6 lakh from the accused.
HOW THE ACCUSED OPERATED
Adil, Vijay Vaghela and Nitesh together searched e-commerce websites and casino betting websites on online search engines and obtained their credit and debit card details, bought products from the payment gateway initially set up on the website and made transactions.
They manipulated the website using debugging software by entering the original price or a set amount into the payment gateway and placing orders to dummy addresses.
The trio altered product prices from Rs 1 lakh to just a few rupees before purchasing them. They used the response script change technique, modifying a Rs 1 lakh product’s price to ‘Rs 0’ through debugging software.
The e-commerce websites targeted by cyber thugs include jinpngjewellers and robu.in. Using the same modus operandi, the accused bought a drone worth 2.5 lakhs for ‘Rs 0’ and sold it for more than Rs 1 lakh, earning a profit of 100 percent.
Some gold coins and jewellery were also ordered online for free and were delivered to dummy addresses. The accused used to change their mobile numbers after getting the products delivered.