CBI arrests two conmen for posing as senior officers

The CBI has arrested two persons for allegedly threatening and demanding bribe from a bank fraud case accused impersonating as senior officers of the agency by spoofing the landline number of the central agency, officials said.

This is third such case recently where people have spoofed the landline number of the agency to demand bribe from suspects in a case probed by the agency.

Y Manivardhan Reddy a resident of Hyderabad and Selvam Ramaraj resident of Madurai (Tamil Nadu) were nabbed by the agency in connection with a case registered on Thursday alleging they were threatening and demanding huge amounts as bribes from various individuals who were facing cases with Central Law Enforcement Agencies.

"In this connection they have contacted one of the accused in a CBI case pertaining to a Bank fraud, and demanded huge amount of money in the name of senior CBI officials posted at New Delhi," CBI Spokesperson Nitin Wakankar said in a statement.

They allegedly used a malicious software to spoof the landline telephone number 011-24302700 of CBI Head Office, New Delhi to call an accused in a bank fraud case probed by the agency, it said.

In the calls made on the accused's mobile phone, the duo posed themselves as senior CBI officers from New Delhi and demanded bribe for getting favours in the case against him, the spokesperson said.

In recent months, the CBI had come across two such cases where accused spoofed phone number of agency to call people facing probe in various cases.

In one of the cases, the person posed as Director CBI to demand bribe.