INTERPOL Apprehends 8 in Significant Phishing and Romance Fraud Crackdown in West Africa
INTERPOL has publicized the apprehension of eight individuals in Côte d’Ivoire and Nigeria as part of a crackdown on phishing scams and romance cyber fraud.
The initiative, named Operation Contender 2.0, has been formulated to address cyber-enabled crimes in West Africa, as per the agency’s statement.
An instance of such a menace included a widespread phishing scam aimed at Swiss citizens, leading to financial repercussions exceeding $1.4 million.
The fraudsters masqueraded as buyers on minor advertising platforms and utilized QR codes to lead victims to counterfeit websites imitating a legitimate payment service.
This facilitated victims unwittingly divulging personal details like their login credentials or card particulars. The culprits also pretended to be customer service representatives of the undisclosed platform over the phone to intensify the deception.
The primary suspect in the attacks admitted to the scheme and profiting illicitly to the tune of over $1.9 million. Five other individuals engaging in cybercriminal pursuits at the same premises have also been detained.
In a distinct case, authorities revealed they had seized a suspect and their partner in Nigeria on April 27, 2024, concerning a romance scam subsequent to alerts from Finnish authorities to the Nigerian Police Force via INTERPOL about a victim defrauded of a “significant sum.”
Such financial grooming offenses involve scammers fabricating bogus online personas on dating apps and social networking sites to foster romantic or intimate bonds with potential victims, ultimately extracting money from them.
“Exploiting the escalating dependence on technology in all facets of our daily routines, cybercriminals are deploying an array of tactics to pilfer data and perpetrate deceitful acts,” mentioned Neal Jetton, Director of the Cybercrime Directorate.
“These recent fruitful partnerships, under the umbrella of Operation Contender 2.0, showcase the significance of continuous international collaboration in combatting cybercrime and prosecuting wrongdoers.”
The development arises as per the U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ) announcing that a 45-year-old dual national of Nigeria and the United Kingdom, Oludayo Kolawole John Adeagbo, has been handed a seven-year prison term for his involvement in a multimillion-dollar business email compromise (BEC) plot.
Adeagbo “colluded with others to engage in numerous cyber-enabled BEC schemes defrauding a North Carolina university of over $1.9 million, and trying to misappropriate in excess of $3 million from entities in Texas, encompassing local government bodies, construction firms, and a college in the Houston area,” as indicated by the DoJ statement.
It follows Meta’s announcement of its collaboration with U.K. financial institutions to thwart scams on its networks within an information-sharing alliance termed Fraud Intelligence Reciprocal Exchange (FIRE).
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