May 23: A spike in data theft, fraud and other cyber crimes in Sector V companies has prompted police to ask all BPO firms or call centres in the tech hub to furnish details about themselves and their employees within seven working days.
The notice is being sent out to all BPO firms, including the smaller ones that operate from inconspicuous and temporary addresses. The decision to compile a comprehensive directory was taken at a meeting earlier this month to discuss the increasing incidence of theft and fraud involving Sector V firms.
Santosh Pandey, deputy commissioner of the detective department in the Bidhannagar police commissionerate, said a database would help the police probe complaints about data theft and other IT crimes faster. "We have asked everyone to furnish their details. This is a compulsory exercise."
The details asked for include the lease and rent agreements of the premises from where the BPO companies operate. The notice mentions that companies have to specify how they receive payments for services and provide details of their payment gateways.
An officer in the commissionerate said many small office spaces in Sector V were available for rent by the hour, offering fly-by-night operators to use these to cheat clients based mainly in the US and Europe. "We have information that such offices with ready Internet connections and workstations are given out on rent at hourly rates. No records are kept and hence such premises are in demand among dubious operatives."
According to an official of the Nabadiganta Industrial Township Authority that administers Sector V, there are 206 IT companies, 17 banks, 48 manufacturing units and 19 telecom service providers in the tech hub. The number of large and small BPO firms operating in the township is around 300, he said.
Many of the smaller firms do not have the requisite permissions to operate as service providers and are allegedly involved in scamming clients and their customers. Lawyer Bivas Chatterjee, who has handled many cyber crime cases, said the police's initiative had come not a day too soon. "We need to have a system in place where law-enforcement agencies know which BPO is being run by whom and doing exactly what sort of business."
On May 17, a young man named Sheikh Anisul Islam was arrested for data theft. He had quit his job recently and was allegedly siphoning off funds from e-wallets. Bikash Kumar Rawani and Subrata Das were arrested in February for pilfering from bank accounts. The duo used to work for a BPO firm handling customer-care services for a bank.
In March last year, a police team from Germany and the CID had raided a BPO firm's office in connection with a cheating complaint lodged by a German company.
