Gang blackmailing men, one held in Faridabad

Faridabad, June 25

The local police claimed to have busted a racket of blackmailing men on the basis of making their objectionable (nude) videos by using their deepfakes. One person has been arrested.

PRO of the district police Sanjay Kumar said the accused identified as Guldeen, a resident of Paldi village of Deeg district of Rajasthan, was nabbed from Agra Chowk on Monday night on the basis of inputs.

He said the accused had been a part of a gang consisting of about five members who had been involved in cybercrime of this nature in the NCR for the past several months. The accused had been active on social media platforms, WhatsApp and Facebook, by putting up fake profiles of girls. He used to make video calls to male customers on the pretext of friendship.

It is revealed that the accused who used to play nude videos during the call to customers would record it with screen recorders to prepare a clip showing the deepfake of the customer. The clip was then sent to the victims to blackmail them with the accused seeking money to the tune of at least Rs 50,000 or more. The victims were asked to transfer the amount to the accounts opened on a fake address which was then distributed among all the gang members, it is learnt. According to the police, the accused has been taken on a two-day police remand for further interrogation to know the details of the racket and their modus operandi. More arrests would take place soon, the police said.