Cyber Crime Police Arrest Two in Loan App Case, Seize Laptops

The Cyber Crime Police of CCS arrested two suspects in connection with the loan app case on Wednesday. Shabbir Alam and Umakanth Yadav of Bangalore were running a call center called Sky Links Technology Pvt. Ltd in Koramangala, Bangalore, and were operating loan applications called Ocean Rupee, Life Wallet, Maloo Wallet, Elephant Cash, Box Cash, and Dutta Rupee under the sole supervision of a Chinese person named Chen Chaoping (who is currently in China).

The apps are located in Google Play Store, and whenever unexpecting people download the app, the software obtains permissions for the gallery, contact list, and locations for granting a loan for a brief period of time, after which the victims must pay very high interest. When the victims were unable to repay the loan amounts, the accused Shabbir Alam and his partner Umakant Yadav turned to blackmailing tactics, threatening to morph their images and publish them on social media platforms.

The duo had targeted a woman from the city residing in Rethibowli, because she had taken loans from various loan applications available on Google Play Store (approximately Rs. 2 lakhs) after  7 days she failed to repay, threatening calls were made to her from different Whatsapp numbers and abused her in vulgar language. The cops took 63 laptop computers and 19 mobile phones from their possession. It should be remembered that in the year 2020, the Chinese National Chen Chaoping operated the Loan Apps call centre in Bangalore under the name of Golden Bag Technologies Pvt. Ltd and hired about 100 tele-callers and opened a new call centre in Koramangala, Bangalore and trained the tele-callers on how to extort money from victims in any way possible. Fearing arrest, the Chinese native fled the country and continued to operate with the assistance of his henchmen.