Online lottery racket busted, three Nigerians arrested

New Delhi, (IANS) Delhi Police's Special Cell has busted an international fake online lottery and arrested three Nigerian nationals for the racket.

"Of the three accused, Sunday Chosen and Omasuyi were arrested from Tilak Nagar area while Huei was arrested from Mahavir Nagar area of west Delhi Wednesday. The trio came to India in the first week of December last year,"
a senior police officer said.

The arrest came after police received a complaint about being duped of Rs.700,000 by a gang involved in online lottery. Four laptops, six mobile phones and several ATM cards were recovered from their possession.

"On interrogation, they revealed that initially they used to collect data of Indian Internet users through phishing and then send e-mails, SMSs and mobile calls to lure people in the name of lottery and prize winners," the officer added.

"They used to ask people to deposit Rs.50,000 initially as processing fee in certain bank accounts and the gang members withdrew the cash through ATM cards in Tilak Nagar, Vikaspuri and Mahavir Nagar area," he further said.

"They have cheated about 30-35 people and amassed about Rs.1.5 crore (Rs.15 million). They sent some money to their home and rest was used to lead a lavish life style here," the police officer added.

"They used to send e-mails giving a UK phone number to convince people. It was also found that calls to this number were diverted to mobile numbers being operated in Delhi, and finally it was zeroed down to Tilak Nagar," he said.