The Police Special Fraud Unit (PSFU) in Lagos has arrested a 32-year-old undergraduate, Timothy Fashina Oluwabukola, from Moshood Abiola Polytechnic (MAPOLY) in Abeokuta, Ogun State, and a co-conspirator, Anthony ImoninaOdemerho, the Proprietor of Resign Regal Academy in Benin City, Edo State.
They were arrested for alleged offences including cyber fraud, money laundering, fraudulent conversion, and stealing of airtime valued at N1,227,140,000.00.
The arrests were made following a petition to the Police by a GSM operator in Nigeria after an Audit Report showed discrepancies between Revenue Collection Accounts and Fulfillments.
It was revealed that between February and March 2024, Timothy Fashina, along with unidentified third-party web/application developers of the GSM Company, used a Virtual Private Network (VPN) to encrypt their data and mask their IP addresses.
They compromised the GSM provider’s network by using authorization keys to gain access to the Application Programme Interface (API) of the firm.
Timothy Fashina manipulated the API to replicate N100,000.00 airtime tickets genuinely bought on the network, resulting in fraudulent airtime fulfillments totalling N1,227,140,000.00, sent to GSM numbers 08XXXXXX72, 08XXXXXX14, and 07XXXXXX28.
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Subsequently, Anthony Imonina downloaded the mobile app of the GSM provider from the Play Store and signed in using Timothy Fashina’s phone number.
To access the app dashboard, Anthony Imonina needed an OTP from the GSM provider, sent as an SMS to the phone hosting the sim card.
Anthony Imonina contacted Timothy Fashina, who promptly provided the OTP before it timed out. After inputting the OTP, Anthony Imonina gained access to the app and converted fraudulently obtained airtime to data using the app’s features.
He then shared/sold the data to fifty-two innocent subscribers, including individuals and companies.
The sum of N1,314,644,835 received for the sold data was traced to Anthony Imonina’s bank accounts. He transferred N1,220,147,000.00 to Timothy Fashina after deducting his commission of N87,497,835.00.
The proceeds of the fraud include 110 hectares of farmland in Iseyin, Oyo State (N40,000,000.00), an uncompleted building in Oluwo, Abeokuta, Ogun State (N6,000,000.00), a 2-storey warehouse in Okeyeke, Abeokuta, Ogun State (value yet to be determined), inventory of stocks in the warehouse (N50,000,000.00), towing/truck head (N24,000,000.00), a crypto wallet with 21,000 USDT, gifts to friends (N16,000,000.00), 2 Hiace buses, a Toyota Sienna, and a Volkswagen bus.
The Legal Section of the Unit has filed criminal charges against the suspects at the Federal High Court, Ikoyi, Lagos. Efforts are underway to apprehend the third-party developers involved in the syndicate and to identify other assets acquired with the proceeds of fraud.
