The Electronic Crime Branch and the Criminal Investigation Department of the Sharjah Police have arrested a Cameroonian national identified as MBA and solved an email crime called the ‘Spider Monument Mail’.
The sophisticated email fraud created an imaginary tunnel between a seller and a buyer, and money was picked up by a middle-man, who then disappeared, leaving the two sides locked in a lengthy court dispute.
Despite several warnings about email scams and businesses being alert to such frauds the success of the ‘Spider Monument Mail’ scam hinged on its simplicity, and therefore, believability.
What makes the case even more alarming is the accused dared to use a local bank account to perpetuate the scam.
MBA is accused of manipulating people into revealing their e-mail IDs and then gaining access to their accounts by unknown methods.
MBA then put a buyer and seller in touch, using one or the other’s email.
The fraud revolved around supplying materials for the construction of a building called ‘Spider Monument’.
The Sharjah Police were able to bust the scam after a local businessman filed a complaint stating that he had been cheated out of Dh73,000.
According to the police, the businessman who owns a trading company in the UAE, says he was contacted on email by a foreign company asking to supply wood worth Dh73,000 for the project called the Spider Monument.
The businessman was first asked to wire the money abroad.
When he refused to do so, he received an email asking him to deposit the money in a local bank account on behalf of MBA.
The businessman deposited the cheque, it was cashed, and then never heard anything about the deal again.
The Electronic Crime Branch of Sharjah Police then launched a probe which led to the arrest of the suspect, who admitted to his crime.
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