5 foreigners held for Siphoning off money from ATMs

New Delhi: Five Romanian nationals, including two women, were arrested in north Delhi's Sadar Bazar area for allegedly siphoning off money from ATMs using cloned plastic cards, police said on Monday.

The accused have been identified as Castache Irina (27), Caragica Elisabeta (22), Lavtaru Ion (38), Dumitro Nicolae (36), Nistor Llie (36), they said. The accused used to frequently visit India and identify unmanned ATM booths across Delhi. They used to cover their face with mask or helmet and withdrew money with cloned plastic cards, police said.

On January 31, police received information that a skimming device with camera was found at an ATM of the IDBI Bank's Sadar Bazar Branch, Deputy Commissioner of Police (north) Nupur Prasad said.

On analysing CCTV footage of the ATM booth, it was found that two women with masks on entered the booth and installed a skimming device along with a camera in the ATM, she said.

Around 3.30 pm the same day, Costache Irina and Caragica Elisabeta were apprehended as they entered the ATM wearing masks, Prasad said, adding a case was registered at the Sadar Bazar Police Station and an investigation was initiated.

On the instance of the two arrested women, another accused Dumito Nicolae was arrested. Later, two more accused, Lavtaru Lon and Nistor Llie, were also nabbed, the DCP said.

During interrogation, the accused revealed that they used to install the skimming device, comprising a small battery and memory chip, in ATMs to capture the data of customers came to withdraw money.

They also used to install camera and a memory card along with a chip in the ATMs, the police officer said.

They would take out the devices from the ATM later and transferred customers' data captured through skimming device into plastic cards having magnetic strip, she said.

Rs 94,000, 102 cloned plastic cards, two laptops, four mobile phones, one skimming device, and one camera device were seized from the accused, police said.