One of the internet fraudsters paraded by the police in Abuja on Monday, Zakarriyah Yahaya, has revealed how he and his gang emptied the bank accounts of many Nigerians using lost or stolen SIM cards.
Yahaya, who is among 39 suspects paraded for various crimes at the defunct headquarters of Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), Abuja by the Nigerian Police, explained that bank accounts of many Nigerians receiving alerts are easy to access by using their account and phone numbers.
The suspects were arrested across the country by Force Investigation Bureau of Intelligence Response Team (IRT) led by Tunji Disu, who took over recently from the suspended Deputy Commissioner of Police, Abba Kyari.
Speaking to journalists, the suspect said, “my name is Zakarriyah Yahaya, I was born and brought up in Jos. I was arrested last month in Mabushi here in Abuja. I used to reset any SIMs that received a bank alert. I will reset it and steal all the money inside the bank account.
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“I do reset it with the victim’s bank account number through the bank code from the first to the last number. Any bank that we get, we first use it to buy a recharge card, from there, they will send us the alert. From the alert, we will now get the account number,” he said.
When asked for the banks they are mostly interested in, he said First Bank and Access Bank because they are easy to reset.
He disclosed that they started the job in the last two years and no fewer than eleven members of the gang are working for him, adding that they are operating in three main cities: Kano, Plateau and Abuja.
He said he could not recall the exact numbers of bank accounts they’d stolen from but they had once removed N800, 000 from one of the accounts.
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Explaining how they operate from the police’s investigation, the force spokesman, Frank Mba said the criminals do acquire SIM packs in large numbers and reactivate old phone numbers people don’t use again and explore any bank account’s details.
Mba said, “Yahaya Zakari controls multiple gangs of cyber crooks whose talk-in-trade is to go after SIM cards, phone numbers of innocent Nigerians, breaking into their privacy, steal their banks’ IDs, and steal monies from the accounts.
The senior police officer also said the criminals do attack their victims physically, collect their phones and target their SIM, adding that they are not interested in the phones but the SIM cards.
He, however, appealed to Nigerians to guide their phone’s well and quickly report to their banks and service providers if their phones get lost.