In a major breakthrough, police have busted a high-tech VoIP calling scam run from Ahmedabad, which allegedly cheated thousands of citizens by impersonating Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) officials and threatening to block SIM cards.
The cybercrime racket, which has been operating since 2021, was exposed after the arrest of two key members: Lovekesh Kumar, nabbed in Delhi, and Anubhav Gupta (also known as Anurag Gupta) in Uttarakhand. The duo, working under the direction of a Chinese national Cindy Wan, had ties to international cybercrime syndicates operating out of Thailand, Malaysia, Iran, Iraq, and China.
Victims were first contacted via Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) calls and told their SIM cards would be blocked within two hours. Once alarmed, the targets were digitally arrested, coerced, and defrauded through investment and identity scams.
The calls were routed via international servers in Germany and then to a concealed server hub located in a building near PERD Centre in Thaltej, Ahmedabad. According to officials, Ahmedabad was selected strategically due to its STD code ‘079’, which made the scam calls appear as local mobile numbers, increasing credibility.
The racket’s infrastructure was massive. Lovekesh Kumar and Taruna Wadhwa established a front company that initially used 1,500 VoIP lines and later added two more systems to handle 4,500 simultaneous calls, enabling over 65,000 scam calls daily between April 20 and April 24.
The group used Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) to mask their operations, allowing international scam calls to seem domestic. The Gujarat ATS, acting on a tip, raided the Thaltej site and uncovered three servers used for routing these calls.
Cyber Crime DCP Lavina Sinha confirmed the suspects were working with Cindy Wan, who directed operations and technical support. The accused also maintained connections with gangs in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Hong Kong.
Both suspects had prior charges: Kumar was previously booked in a visa fraud case in Karnal, Haryana, while Gupta was out on bail in a Sonipat cybercrime case from March 2023.
