The Nigerian Police Force, Oyo State Command has warned Nigerians to be more vigilant as fraudsters keep coming up with new mechanisms and now use a new trick to defraud unsuspecting innocent people.
The command reportedly said this yesterday during the parade of ten fraudsters who were arrested for using sim swap to empty the bank accounts of their victims. Among the alleged victims of the fraudsters is Professor Olapade James, The Dean, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of Ibadan.
The ten suspects arrested are: Omotayo Azeez, 29, Olufade Abdulgafar, 33, Adesina Peter, 32, Odugbesan Gbenga, 39, Shiyanbola Harry, 32, Effiog Udofia, 52, Arowosegbe Adewale, 43, Adesanlu Kayode, 32, Onasile Abiola, 25, and Temitope Fatai, 21.
The Oyo Sate Police Commissioner, Shina Olukolu, said:
On March 14, Adeniyi Ige, the Security Manager of Airtel Network Limited, reported that his company received complaints from customers regarding withdrawal of various amounts of money from their bank accounts, through fraudulent SIM cards swapping.
The complainants included Prof. Olapade James, the Dean, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of Ibadan, who reported that on February 21, he experienced loss of signal on his line.
Following this, he said he started receiving notification of debit alerts from his bank account via email, adding that N180,000 was fraudulently withdrawn from his bank account.
Also one Godwin Unigbe reported that on February 22, N3m was fraudulently withdrawn from his bank account. Benjamin Udo Bassey reported that N460,000 was fraudulently withdrawn from his account between February 20 and 21.
Following the reports, an internal investigation traced the fraudulent SIM card swapping to ISON BPO, a call centre to network service providers, including Airtel Network, located in Ibadan.
This led to the arrest of three workers of ISON directly involved in the fraudulent act. Further investigation led to the arrest of seven other suspects.
They (fraudsters) will call you to give certain information and as you give the information step by step, what follows is that your phone will go blank.
After some minutes, it will be back again, and a few minutes later, you will be receiving debit alerts via email. They have swapped your SIM card. Don’t give information to somebody you do not know.”
