Sources : Times News Network

Date of Publishing:07/07/2010

Hyderabad: Hyderabad police commissioner A K Khan on Tuesday said there is a spurt in new generation financial frauds and admitted that cracking them has been a tough task as they lack expertise.

Addressing delegates at a joint workshop on 'Bank Frauds - Prevention and Investigation', organised by a private bank and the Hyderabad police, the commissioner said that in the last one decade financial frauds have seen an exponential growth due to advancement in information and communication technology.

Referring to credit card frauds and online crimes like phishing and lottery frauds, Khan said that there was a 20 to 30 per cent rise in financial frauds in the 100-odd police stations in the city.

Till the 1990s, the main trend in financial fraud was forging signatures and closing a shop after collecting huge principal amounts at exorbitant interests. "Now, people collect money through websites and clone credit cards (plastic currency)," he added.

The top cop said lack of expertise in investigating these hi-tech financial fraud cases has been a standing problem with the force.

"The existing staff is not well trained in solving the ‘new-age financial frauds’. There is a need to train at least 30 to 40 officers to deal with such cases and we are on that job," Khan said.

He confessed that 'crime' cannot be eliminated but it could only be controlled. "We are cracking cases that happen outside banks and financial institutions, but to solve cases related to financial frauds, we need cooperation from institutions. The agencies should also step up security and work towards a foolproof security mechanism," he added.

Keeping in view financial frauds and cyber crimes, the state government gave permission to start two new cyber crime police stations in Hyderabad and Cyberabad commissionerates.

The Hyderabad cyber police station is all set to be launched in a week’s time with an ACP rank-level official as its head at Basheerbagh.

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