Mumbai: The cyber wing of Maharashtra Police has rescued more than 60 Indian nationals who were tortured and forced into cyber slavery in Myanmar, and arrested five agents, including a foreign national, a senior official said here on Friday.
The victims in the case were promised high-paying jobs abroad, but were threatened and physically tortured to commit cyber frauds there, he said.
This is perhaps the biggest action taken by the Maharashtra Cyber in a cyber slavery case with the help of the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) and Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), he said.
Cyber slavery is an emerging form of exploitation that begins with online deception and evolves into physical human trafficking.Maharashtra Cyber has registered three First Information Reports (FIRs) in this connection, he said.
The racketeers contacted the victims through social media platforms and lured them with high-paying jobs in Thailand and other East Asian countries, he said.
The agents arranged passports and flight tickets for the victims and sent them to Thailand on tourist visas. After landing in the country, they were sent to the Myanmar border, where they were made to cross a river in small boats.
On entering Myanmar, the victims were taken to guarded compounds controlled by armed rebel groups, where they were forced to commit cyber frauds ranging from ‘digital arrest’ scams to fake investment schemes on an industrial scale.
Maharashtra Cyber, along with other agencies, rescued the victims, the official said, without giving details as to whether the operation was carried out inside Myanmar.