Over 280 cases of ATM fraud and robberies reported this year in Capital

New delhi: While the Delhi Police has prioritised securing ATMs, over 280 cases of ATM fraud and robberies have been reported this year in the Capital. This also includes more than 35 cases where ATMs were broken into by gangs specialising in such heists.

The Delhi Police data on this, accessed by Millennium Post, showed that till mid December, there were over 30 cases where people were robbed near ATMs while they were either withdrawing or depositing cash. Of these, nine have been solved. In one of the districts, nearly dozen such cases were reported out of which four were solved.

In over 35 cases of ATM breaking and theft, Delhi Police claimed to have solved more than 20. Millennium Post had earlier this year reported that the city had over 2,300 ATMs without any security guard at their premises. While it would be presumable that ATM cameras will be able to identify the culprits, many uproot the system just to make sure they can erase video evidence. The Delhi Police have also suggested banks to ensure their ATM surveillance footage is stored on cloud services.

As per officials, gangs involved in uprooting ATMs, first, try to break the ATM and at last, when there is no possibility of opening the ATM, they uproot the whole machine. "We have found the role of gangs from Mewat. They regularly keep equipment through which they can break or uproot ATM," one official said.

The data further shows that over 210 cases of ATM frauds were reported in which more than 40 cases were solved. In one district more than 60 cases were reported. An official said that there are various kinds of ATM frauds which include card cloning, exchanging ATM cards.

"These fraudsters search for people who have less knowledge about debit cards and on the pretext of helping them, the fraudsters change the ATM card of the victim after knowing their ATM pin and later withdraw money," the official said.

An advisory was issued by Delhi Police which read "Recently, there have been several incidents in which ATMs have been uprooted and carried away in trucks, pick-up vans by criminal elements. Most of these cases have been solved and ATM robbers have been arrested," read the advisory.

The most important point which came up during interrogation of these criminals was the gang members move in a taxi they have kept specifically for this purpose. They disclosed that police usually does not check taxis very thoroughly at night. After uprooting, the targeted ATM, they make sure that CCTV camera and DVR, if any, are not left behind, advisory read.