The National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency (NCCIA) has arrested 12 members of an international network accused of impersonating foreign embassy officials to defraud citizens seeking visas and immigration services.
NCCIA Punjab Director Muhammad Ali Wasim, addressing a press conference alongside Additional Director Hassam Bin Iqbal, said that the gang had been posing as officials from embassies including Italy, Germany, Sweden, Oman and Saudi Arabia for several years, defrauding visa and immigration applicants of millions of rupees.
The arrests followed a raid on a fake call centre operating out of Bahria Town Phase IV in Rawalpindi, carried out by the NCCIA’s Gujranwala Circle.
Wasim explained the suspects created fake Google business profiles, bogus websites and forged official documents to pass themselves off as staff of foreign diplomatic missions. He added that the gang manipulated online search results so that people searching for embassy contact details were redirected to fraudulent phone numbers controlled by the network, using call-forwarding and caller ID spoofing to route official embassy numbers to their own lines.
Once in contact with victims through phone calls and WhatsApp, the suspects, posing as embassy officials, would demand hefty payments for visa appointments, immigration processing, document verification and other purported consular services.
The director noted that the group also relied on intimidation to win victims’ confidence.
“Members of the gang appeared in video calls wearing Singapore Police uniforms and falsely claimed to be law enforcement officials,” he said, adding that the mastermind had recruited Arabic speakers, including those fluent in the Saudi dialect, along with speakers of other foreign languages, to reinforce the impression that they worked for embassies and government bodies.
Wasim stated that the network had been operating since 2019 and had since expanded into Oman and Saudi Arabia. He said that efforts were underway to trace the group’s financial transactions, identify further victims, arrest suspects still at large and probe its international connections.
Investigators recovered 21 mobile phones, a car, a Singapore Police uniform, forged appointment letters, phishing emails, fake Google business profiles, PTCL records and multiple Gmail accounts. All were sent for forensic examination.
“There is no place for those who undermine public trust or attempt to use the country’s territory for international cyber fraud,” Wasim remarked, adding that the agency would keep pursuing cybercrime networks that exploit the names of government institutions and foreign missions.
