Operation Chakra-VI: CBI Dismantles Digital Arrest Network Using Fake Supreme Court Portal

In a massive pan-India crackdown, the CBI has raided 80 locations to bust a sophisticated cybercrime ring that weaponized the judiciary’s reputation to extort victims.

The digital arrest racket, which has plagued citizens for months, finally hit a wall this week. In a coordinated sweep codenamed ‘Operation Chakra-VI,’ the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) launched raids across 16 states, targeting the infrastructure behind a criminal network that used a website deceptively mimicking the official Supreme Court URL to trap victims. From Punjab and Gujarat to the far reaches of the northeast in Assam and Manipur, 60 specialized teams fanned out to dismantle what investigators call a highly organized financial scaffolding.

The scheme relied on psychological manipulation. Victims were presented with forged court documents and fake legal orders, all hosted on a fraudulent domain designed to mirror the Supreme Court’s identity. The credibility provided by this fake portal allowed the perpetrators to orchestrate "digital arrests," coercing targets into transferring money under the threat of fabricated legal action. The trail went cold only after the Supreme Court Registry itself flagged the abuse, filing a formal complaint that triggered the CBI’s intervention.

The Money Trail and Key Arrests

The investigation revealed a sprawling web of shell companies and mule bank accounts used to launder approximately ₹2 crore in proceeds of crime. While the agency has identified criminal infrastructure operating both domestically and abroad, the ground-level arrests have begun with B. Naresh from Chennai and Sanjib Saha from Kolkata. These two individuals are believed to be instrumental in managing the flow of illicit funds, linking the digital fraud to physical financial hubs.

According to agency officials, this specific network is tied to over 200 individual cases of extortion. By leveraging advanced forensic tools and technical intelligence, the CBI managed to pierce the anonymity that usually protects such digital rackets. The raids were not merely about recovering data; they were a systemic attempt to uproot the call centers and technical support teams that provide these scams with their veneer of legitimacy.

Why it matters

This operation highlights a dangerous evolution in cybercrime: the weaponization of institutional trust. By impersonating the highest court in the land, these criminals exploited the average citizen’s fear of the law, turning the judiciary's authority into a tool for extortion. For the CBI, the challenge now lies in dismantling the cross-border elements of the network. If the "digital arrest" phenomenon is to be contained, the focus must shift from merely chasing individual mule accounts to disrupting the technical infrastructure—the fake websites and VoIP systems—that allow these networks to operate with such brazen reach. The scale of these 80 raids suggests that law enforcement is finally catching up to the sophisticated, tech-first methodologies of modern organized crime.