Online ponzi scam: Look out circular against Chinese national

Bhubaneswar: On the request of Economic Offence Wing (EOW), Odisha, a look out circular was issued against Chinese national Guanhua Wang, one of the main accused in an online ponzi scam, an official said here on Monday. The look out circular was issued by Bureau of Immigration (BOI), the Union Ministry of Home Affairs.

Guanhua (40) is wanted in a huge pan-India online ponzi scam involving fraud and siphoning of hundreds of crores of rupees out of India using a complex network of mule bank accounts, shell companies and crypto-traders, said the EOW official. Originally from China's Hangzhou city, he formed a company called Bettec Technologies Private Limited in 2019 based in Dickenson Road, Bengaluru.

He also controls at least two other Bengaluru-based companies, Gamecamp Solutions Private limited and Byrontec Technologies Private Limited, through his mule directors. During initial investigation, the EOW found that the accused had siphoned more than Rs 100 crore through his company. It has frozen around Rs 70 lakh from his company’s account.

The Financial Intelligence Unit has been requested to provide details of its other accounts, informed the official. The Chinese national visited India six times in 2019 and 2020, mainly Bengaluru. After that, he had been running this scam from China with the help of many India-based associates.

Guanhua’s Indian associates are managing the mule bank accounts, shell companies and crypto-traders, WhatsApp/Telegram group tutors and also running advertising using the morphed photos of celebrities. To lure the investors, these scammers were using the morphed photographs of big celebrities like Amitabh Bachhan, Mukesh Ambani, Ratan Tata, Sachin Tendulkar, Technical Guruji (YouTuber), among others.

The EOW officials said the scamsters also used the logo of big companies like Tata to mislead/impress people on various social media platforms like Instagram and YouTube. The total transactions in the above suspected bank accounts are more than Rs 1,000 crore, sources said.

In the last one year, EOW Odisha has found that at least in 3 cases (including the current case) cyber-financial frauds involving hundreds of crores of rupees were being run by the Chinese nationals.