Businessman Held Over N30m Bank Hack

Operatives of the Police Special Fraud Unit (PSFU) have foiled an attempt by suspected hackers to squander N28 million of N30 million they stole from the accounts of a new generation bank’s customers.

The police unit said it secured a court order mandating the bank to reverse the N28 million found in the account of Diemo Dinolarge, said to be the Managing Director of Dino-Large Limited.

The suspect, said to be in police net, was alleged to be a member of a notorious fraud syndicate that specialised in cloning victims’ information which they used to hack their accounts in order to carry out fraudulent practices.

Dinolarge allegedly received the N30million through his personal account which necessitated his arrest by the police, adding that two million was already short from the money at the time the account was flagged.

Spokesman for the PSFUA, SP Eyitayo Johnson, who confirmed the arrest in a statement, said the Federal High Court, Lagos granted the prayers of the unit for the reversal of the remaining N28 million.

“On November 2, the Federal High Court, Lagos; granted the prayers of ASP. Daniel Apochi, of PSFU for the reversal of N28 million being part of N30 million transferred to the Account Number 1013160804 (Account Name: Diemo Dinolarge Onokpite).

“The Acount Holder is the Managing Director of Dino-Large Limited and member of a Cyber/Advance Fee Fraud syndicate who hacked into the computers of a New-Generation Deposit Money Bank and successfully harvested customers’ data.

“The harvested information was used to generate cloned emails through which fake instruction for the transfer of N30million to the account of Diemo Dinolarge was given.

“Operatives of the unit, while utilising existing synergy with the victims’ and suspect’s banks; swiftly placed Post-No-Debit (PND) on the account while the Federal High Court was approached to reverse the money.

“The sum of two million Naira had been dissipated before the PND was emplaced while the remaining N28 million was recovered by the Order of the Court.

“Diemo Dinolarge who acts as “Picker” for the syndicate was tracked and arrested as investigation continues to apprehend other members of his syndicate.”

Johnson said operatives of the unit were also on the trail of one Mrs. Lily and other accomplices of Dinolarge over their alleged involvement in the Business Email Compromise (BEC).

He said the unit also secured a court order madating two Deposit Money Banks (DMOs) to reverse to the original owner the sums of N13 million and two million naira swindled from them.

Johnson said investigation traced the monies to Alibababa Information Trading account number 1023240381 at UBA Bank and Guang Dong Shou Wang Trading account number 1016167633 with Zenith International Bank.

According to Johnson, the money was supposed to be used for the purchase of Chinese Yuan for the victim, adding that a lien was placed on the account to prevent the owner from withdrawing any amount.