Surat: Cybercrime police arrested three persons for allegedly obtaining point-of-sale (POS) machines using fake Udyam firms and supplying them to a Rajasthan-based gang involved in debit card cloning. The cloned cards were swiped on these POS machines, after which the money was withdrawn in Surat.A Surat resident complained that the credentials of his firm, Shidhi Vinayak Novelty, were misused to obtain an Udyam certificate. Based on the complaint, police arrested Manthan Kukadiya, who allegedly got a POS machine issued from Axis Bank in the firm’s name. Further investigation led to the arrests of Priyanshu Mehta and Uday Dhaduk. “Kukadiya would get bogus Udyam certificates and get POS machines issued from banks. He got four such machines issued and sent them to Haryana and Rajasthan gangs. These gangs were involved in cloning debit cards. They would get debit card details from ATMs by various means and make cloned cards. They would then use the cloned debit cards on POS machines supplied by the Surat accused. Once the money was transferred to bank accounts linked to the firm to which the POS machine was attached, it was withdrawn in Surat. After the withdrawal, the money was sent back to the Rajasthan gang through cash deposit machines,” a cybercrime police officer said. Police found that more than Rs 11 lakh was deposited into three bank accounts through POS machines supplied by Kukadiya. Mehta allegedly withdrew Rs 2 lakh from one account and deposited it into bank accounts suggested by Dhaduk. Police said Dhaduk supplied the POS machines to the Haryana and Rajasthan gangs as he was associated with them.
