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The Western Zone Cyber Crime police of Greater Chennai Police arrested a key accused involved in a multi-State cyber slavery and financial scam syndicate. The accused, who had been on the run for two years, was intercepted at the Chennai airport immediately upon his return from abroad.
The arrest was made following a complaint lodged on February 8, 2024, by M.K. Ezhilvani, 59, a resident of Kolathur. According to the police, the victim received an intimidating phone call on February 1, 2024, from an individual posing as a Delhi Customs official. The scammer claimed that a fraudulent parcel from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, containing 16 passports, 58 ATM cards, and 140 grams of MDMA , had been intercepted under her name.
The fraudsters escalated the intimidation by transferring the call to a fake Delhi police constable, coercing the victim into maintaining total secrecy, and extracting her personal identification details. Claiming that she was implicated in an illegal money laundering case involving one Sanjay Kumar, the suspects threatened her with immediate arrest.
Under immense psychological duress and believing she was co-operating with law enforcement to clear her name, the victim transferred ₹2.96 lakh from her bank account to an HDFC Bank account located in Anthiyur, Erode, as instructed by the cyber criminals.
Following the complaint, the police traced the recipient account to one Prema who was found to be operating out of a scamming syndicate in Cambodia. She was summoned to Chennai and arrested on March 22, 2024. Her confession led to the arrest of Bala alias Balakrishnan from Madurai on March 25, 2024, who had facilitated her travel to Cambodia. Both individuals were subsequently released on court bail.
During further interrogation, Balakrishnan confessed that Ilavarasan, a native of Karur district, had been working as a restaurant manager in Cambodia since 2023. Ilavarasan was allegedly acting as a crucial local link, directly collaborating with Chinese-run scamming syndicates in Cambodia.
He procured Indian bank account details via agents in Tamil Nadu and lured job seekers to Cambodia under the guise of computer employment, forcing them into cyber scam operations instead.
Based on this intelligence, the Cyber Crime Police issued a Look Out Circular (LOC) against Ilavarasan through immigration department. On July 21, 2026 — two years after the initial complaint — Ilavarasan landed at Chennai International Airport. Immigration officials detained him and handed him over to Western Zone Cyber Crime team.
The police formally arrested the accused and seized his passport and Cambodian currency notes. Initial inquiries revealed that Ilavarasan was involved in multiple cases relating to cyber slavery and financial cheating across various jurisdictions in Tamil Nadu.
Published - July 23, 2026 06:56 pm IST