"The operation is carried out by illegally, accessing e-mail boxes
of Italian and foreign companies through hacking and social engineering
techniques that enabled the criminals to meddle in trade relations.
EFCC operatives
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in collaboration with the Italian Police said it arrested 62 people from Nigeria and Cameroon suspected to be members of a cyber criminal organisation.
The EFCC spokesman, Mr Wilson Uwujaren, in a statement in Abuja
on Thursday said the suspects were responsible for frauds committed
against small and medium scale enterprises across the world.
Uwujaren
said the raid that led to the arrest of the suspects were carried out
in June by 750 officers from Italian, Spanish, Polish, English, Belgian,
Georgian, Turkish and Cameroonian police.
He said
the group, devoted to laundering activities involving large amounts of
money obtained by means of state-of-the-art phishing techniques uses a
particular attack called in hacking jargon, ``man-in-the-middle’’.
"The
operation is carried out by illegally, accessing e-mail boxes of
Italian and foreign companies through hacking and social engineering
techniques that enabled the criminals to meddle in trade relations.
"The
final result of the raid is remarkable with 62 individuals arrested, 82
house searches executed with 40,000 Euros, 30 smart phones, 10 tablets
and 15 personal computers seized,” he said.
The
spokesman said the EFCC was able to track down three fugitives in their
homes in Lagos following information gathered from the Postal and
Communications Police in Italy during the raid.
He said that computers, mobile phones, SIM cards, several storage media as well as bank documents linked to suspected criminal activities were recovered from the suspects during the raid in Lagos.
He said that computers, mobile phones, SIM cards, several storage media as well as bank documents linked to suspected criminal activities were recovered from the suspects during the raid in Lagos.
According
to him, the EFCC has started an independent investigation that will
allow it to confirm the connection with the dismantled group through the
Italian investigation.
Uwujaren said the
investigation would also help to identify new criminal links with South
Africa, Ghana, Gambia, China, UAE, Kenya and Spain.
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