A man suspected to be one of the kingpins of a racket that allegedly sold OTPs to activate WhatsApp accounts using SIM cards that have been procured using fake documents has been arrested from Himachal Pradesh.
The special task force of Bengal police identified the man as Gaurav Sharma, 35, who was brought to Kolkata on Tuesday on transit remand.
“Earlier, eight more persons had been arrested as a part of this racket that was active in selling OTPs to open WhatsApp accounts. Once the accounts were opened, the SIM cards would be physically destroyed so that anyone using these WhatsApp accounts cannot be tracked through the SIM card,” said a senior officer of the Bengal STF.
For activating a WhatsApp account, an OTP has to be fed into the device where the app is being installed. The OTP can be generated only through a text message sent to a phone with a valid SIM card.
However, once the WhatsApp account is activated, it can be used even if the SIM card is destroyed. After that it becomes difficult to track the location of the WhatsApp user as the SIM card — that could have been tracked using the IMEI number of the device where the SIM was inserted — does not exist at all.
“We have found that this group used to sell pre-activated SIM cards which were in turn used to generate OTPs for WhatsApp accounts. The OTPs were being sold through the dark web,” said the officer.
The police said a specific case was started in Murshidabad a few days ago after which the links of this racket were found in the adjoining districts of Kolkata.
Sharma was arrested on February 3 and produced before a court in Himachal Pradesh.
The police said they have seized multiple devices from his possession that were allegedly used for generating OTPs that were sold for creating WhatsApp accounts.
“We are trying to find out how many such OTPs have been generated and sold by this group,” said an officer of the Bengal STF.