NEW DELHI: Acting on a tip off from a Military Intelligence unit in J&K, the Maharashtra ATS and Mumbai Police's crime branch have busted two illegal telephone exchanges allegedly being used for espionage activities and causing a lot of around Rs 50 crores to the government.According to the DoT officials, estimated total revenue loss to the national exchequer by this illegal activity called the " sim box fraud " is worth $75,60,000.Cops along with officials from Department of Telecommunications conducted a raid in Cheetah Camp area of Trombay, Mumbai on and found the first exchange being run by two persons. "70 SIM cards, one router, 3 machines for call transforming (illegal international gateways) were seized in this raid. The callers would deposit money online into banks in Hong Kong.The arrested accused have been identified as Shams Shaikh (34), a Mankhurd residence, Shahid Jamal (36), a resident of Cheetah Camp area of Trombay and Noor Mohammad Shaikh (35),from Chittah camp,Trombay, Mumbai. The owner of the room and one Nassir Hussain (30), a technician have been sent to Police custody till Aug 9.The main accused in the case, Nazim Shaikh (27) went to China to take training for setting up an illegal telephone exchange in Mumbai He runs a cable internet service business, and he duped the slum dwellers into keeping the SIM boxes at their residence in lieu of payment of electricity bills and rent. The residents were told that these were cable internet machines.

Source: Times of India August 09, 2017 17:18 UTC