[ 2016-02-08 ]

SIM box fraud: Police/Subah collaboration retrieves 8,854 SIM cards
The Visa and Documentation Fraud Unit of the
Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the
Ghana Police Service uncovered one of the largest
illegal SIM Box network operations at Gbawe, near
Accra, at dawn last Friday.

The operation, carried out in collaboration with
Subah Infosolutions Ghana Limited, resulted in the
team retrieving 8,854 SIM cards used to facilitate
grey routing of international calls.

The SIM cards, suspected to be unregistered,
included 4,998 already used MTN, 1,694 Airtel, 88
Glo and 48 Tigo cards.

Cards which had not been used included 234 MTN,
1,290 Airtel, 200 Glo and 46 Tigo cards.

The team also retrieved two huge Sim Box machines
loaded with 128 MTN and Airtel SIM cards each,
three power batteries and an inverter.

Nobody was arrested.

The operation

A source close to the Visa Fraud and Documentation
Unit of the CID told the Daily Graphic after the
operation that the team was dispatched to Gbawe
following a tip off that there was a suspicious
operation of international call termination in the
area.

It said the team carried out surveillance at Gbawe
North with a special gadget that allowed it to
search for signals to locate the exact location of
the illegal activity.

According to the source, after three hours, a
signal led the team to a container shop at a place
popularly known as Winner at Gbawe North.

It said the team inquired about the owner of the
shop from residents of a house close by and the
owner told the team that a young man had rented
the place from him to use as a mobile phone
scratch card shop.

But nobody knew the young man.

Outwitting the police

The source said the owner of the house told the
team that the young man who had rented the place
opened the shop on a daily basis for a few weeks
but after a while the shop was closed.

The shop, it said, was broken into, after which
the team discovered that the equipment for
terminating international calls had been mounted
in it and concealed to make it difficult for
visitors to know.

The unit, the source said, had observed that SIM
Box fraudsters were trying to outwit the special
task force which had been going after them by
using remote controlled systems.

It explained that the new system allowed the SIM
Box fraudsters to operate their machines from a
distance without being physically present.

The police, it said, had launched full-scale
investigations into the matter to ensure that
those behind the operations were arrested and
prosecuted.

As of July 2015, it was estimated that the illegal
activity had since 2010 resulted in a loss of $52
million in revenue that should have been paid by
service providers abroad to the state.

Source - Graphic

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