A youth's insistence on not losing Rs 500 to fraudsters has led the Delhi Police to unearth one of the "biggest fake job rackets" that allegedly duped over 27,000 people by offering government jobs through a fake website.
The gang had sent around 15 lakh text messages with web links to fake jobs to targeted sections and is said to have collected Rs 1.09 crore in two months out of which they had withdrawn Rs 49 lakh.
Five men, including the 50-year-old "mastermind" who runs an online examination centre from where he collected data of potential victims, were arrested by Delhi Police's Cyber Cell, Deputy Commissioner of Police Anyesh Roy told reporters.
The arrested were identified as mastermind Ramdhari, account holder Surender Singh (50), web designers Sandeep (32) and Joginder Singh (35) and Amandeep Khatkari (27), who used to withdraw money collected from aspirants. Ramdhari's associate Vishnu Sharma is absconding.
The gang was operating from Haryana's Hisar and had created a fake website in August this year of a fictitious entity -- Swasthya Avm Jan Kalyan Sansthan (SAJKS) -- under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
The fake website was so convincing that some mainstream media reported the news of 13,000 job openings and this led to even more persons falling prey to the fraud, Roy said.
Roy said the details in the websites were designed so that even an experienced person could not find it was fake. It had a graded registration fee for general and reservation category applicants.
The gang allegedly used the data of aspirants appearing for online exams conducted by the government at the centre run by Ramdhari and Vishnu. Using this data, 15 lakh text messages were sent and around 27,000 people had registered with it.
Roy said the data collected by the gang using the online exam centre could have been misused and they were investigating this aspect.
The Cyber Cell jumped into action after one of the youths who submitted Rs 500 for a job found out that the website on which he registered was fake and there were no such job vacancies in the government. He filed a complaint following which the police took over the investigations.
During investigations, the digital footprint of the website was captured and the money trail through a payment gateway was tracked. The gang was allegedly using multiple bogus accounts and digital identities to cover their track, Roy said.
Police also found that Khatkari was withdrawing money through an ATM from the bank account linked to the website to distribute among the gang members and he was first caught, following which others landed in the net.
In an advisory, Delhi Police urged people to apply due caution while applying for jobs through online portals and forums such as social media, instant messaging Apps and emails.
"Genuineness of the website/company and its representatives should be checked from credible sources before applying for a job, or before accepting an invite for an interview, etc. Transfer of money for registration, etc., and other actions such as sending private/confidential details, should be done only after thorough check of the website/company’s credentials," it said.