August 26, 2008	Tuesday	Sha'aban 23, 1429

LAHORE, Aug 25: The Federal Investigation Agency claimed on Monday to have arrested four people, including an acting sub-divisional officer (power) of PTCL, from Faisalabad for illegally running and supervising a latest Atomised Voice Termination System (AVTS)/mini-gateway exchange.

The officials also recovered complete network of illegal voice traffic termination system worth Rs20 million.

This was said by Lahore zone FIA director Muhammad Azam Joyia at a news conference held at Shami Road Cavalry Ground.

He said after receipt of information the cyber crime unit, led by an assistant director, traced out and took into possession the latest AVTS with the help of PTCL technical officials.

He said the accused had linked the PTCL exchange with the traced mini-gateway exchange by spreading about 700 meters underground cable.

They were identified as PTCL supervisor Ghulam Nabi (acting SDO), Amir Husain, Sabir Husain and Majid Ali.

Initial investigations revealed that joint owners of exchange identified as Shahid alias Shahzad and Malik Waqas were residents of Lahore and were still at large.

Mr Joyia said PTCL staff, including DE Sardar Asghar and another supervisor Amanat Ali, had also actively played their role in installation and functioning of the mini-gateway exchange, who had managed to escape.

He claimed the set up, which was the biggest one captured in the history of the country, had been functioning since September 2007 at Faisalabad and culprits used to distribute the international voice traffic bypassing the national gateway exchange of the country in different cities.

He said at present per minute international call traffic services charges were 10 cent and the system had heavy capacity and could manage calls traffic of about 300,000 minutes per day, adding that the accused earned about Rs1 billion as per the calculation.

To a question, the director said since 2005, the agency had traced 23 such mini exchanges and registered cases against the arrested operators while the courts convicted 10 people.

He said the officials were also tracing the account, which was used for the transfer of the money earned from the business.