The Federal Investigation Agency’s (FIA) Cyber Crime Wing has arrested two individuals for filming and blackmailing couples at the University of Karachi (KU).
Head of Cyber Crime, Sindh, Imran Riaz, told media that the suspect used to film couples’ private moments without their consent.
“Last week, we received a complaint from a woman, a student, that she was being forced to meet these men in private and pay a ransom. They threatened to post her videos on YouTube and other social media platforms,” Riaz told media.
A special team of FIA arrested both suspects, identified as Fazal Dad and Adnan Ali, during a raid on Wednesday. Mobile phones and other digital equipment recovered from their possession have been sent for forensics.
Riaz said that ‘objectionable videos and photographs’ of seven couples were found in their phones.
“So far, only one couple has agreed to file a complaint against the men, while the remaining refused to come forward over privacy concerns,” he added.
The FIA has filed a case under the following section of the Pakistan Electronic Crime Act, 2016, and the Pakistan Penal code:
- PECA section 16 – tampering, etc. of communication equipment
- PECA section 20 – malicious code
- PECA section 21 – cyberstalking
- PECA section 24 – Legal recognition of offenses committed in relation to information system
- PPC section 109 – the punishment of abetment if the act abetted committed in consequence and where no express provision is made for its punishment
- PPC section 383 – extortion
The university’s campus security officer, Muhammad Asif, revealed that Dad was the brother of one of the varsity’s security guards, while Adnan was the driver of a professor at the Department of Geography.
While Fazal lives with his brother at the employees quarter in Staff Town, Adnan lives in the servants’ quarter within the university. Both individuals work as part-time rickshaw drivers.
Asif revealed that they filmed obscene videos of a couple in KU’s Hockey Ground. “They obtained the mobile phone number of a woman student at the varsity, sent her obscene material, and blackmailed her for money.
