HYDERABAD: Cyber Crime sleuths of Hyderabad police have busted an interstate gang operating from a small town in Andhra Pradesh with a call centre targeting stock market investment enthusiasts and arrested five organisers. The gang duped 140 victims to the tune of over 1 crore by promising good returns on their investments.

On July 11, a victim lodged a complaint with the Cyber Crime police alleging that some fraudsters had duped him of 2.6 lakh by luring him to transfer the amount into their bank account for stock trading from his DMAT account.
"After the money was transferred, the fraudsters stopped responding to my phone calls," the complainant alleged.

A case was registered under Sections 66 C&D of the IT Act, Sections 419 and 420 of the IPC. During investigation, police zeroed in on Integear Consultancy Pvt Ltd at Pileru town in Andhra Pradesh.
Police identified five organisers, Integear Consultancy Pvt Ltd director T Sai Saran Kumar Reddy, floor managers K Mahesh, R Haribabu Yadav, team leaders K Ajit and M Diwakar.
"The fraudsters have been cheating many stock trading aspirants on the pretext of providing trading tips and securing good returns," deputy commissioner of police (DCP) Cyber Crime Sneha Mehra said.
Police seized six cell phones and 31 laptops from the call centre operated with 38 women tele-callers. Sai Saran Kumar Reddy established the company at Pileru without any permission from appropriate authorities a few months ago. Saying that their company has expertise in stock market analysis and trading, the tele-callers used to lure the victims to agree for investment through them in trading of stocks.
"We found out that the gang has duped 140 victims for 1.08 crore. We are investigating if there are more victims," the DCP said.