Hyderabad: City police nabbed seven people who it said were illegally routing international calls through Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP).

Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police (Task Force) S Chaitanya Kumar said, on Sunday, that raids were conducted at Golkonda, Moghalpura and Tolichowki areas leading to the nabbing of Syed Mohammed Ilyas Sha Buqari and six others. Explaining the modus operandi, Kumar said, "The accused are doing illegal International Call Routing. In this incoming calls are received through Internet and a VOIP gateway that converts the data into voice calls disseminates it to the the receivers." He added that in this process, since the original call details are terminated and substituted with the local IP, there was no trace of the original international number from where the call originated.

He said that the act was not only causing revenue loss to the government and Department of Telcommunications, but was also creating a security threat to the nation. "It is learnt that several international calls originating from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries are being made through these illegal exchanges for cheaper call rates. Also suspected persons staying in these countries prefer to use these illegal exchanges as it does not leave any trace of the original international number from where the call originated," Kumar said.

He said that the accused were sharing their call rates in international forums and groups and people staying abroad would contact them and exchange IP addresses if they agreed on the rates. Police seized Rs 4.80 lakh in cash, nine cellphones, six laptops, 16 ports, wi-fi routers and other electronic equipment from the accused.

PTI