EFCC arrests 5 Yahoo girls, boys posing as US soldiers

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has arrested five suspected cyber criminals, popularly called Yahoo Yahoo, in Barnawa, Kaduna State.

In a statement released on Wednesday, July 3, 2019, the agency said the suspects posed online, particularly on Facebook, as United States soldiers on peace keeping mission in Afghanistan.

Even though the suspects initially claimed to be bloggers and experts in the Bitcoin business, the EFCC said they've confessed to online fraud.

"They stated that they operate by creating fake Facebook pages using display pictures and names belonging to mostly foreigners in order to deceive unsuspecting victims mostly females of white nationality.

"Another mode of operation is to link up with their other conspirators known as pickers residing in US and Ghana to help in receiving their loot via their dollar accounts domiciled in the US for onwards transfer to their boss in Nigeria after they must have duped their victims.

"They added that usually, they give 30% of their loot to these pickers while the remaining 70% is shared among the remaining members," the EFCC said.

Items recovered by the EFCC include a yellow ELEPAC generator, two HP and one Del laptop, two Huawei Network wifi, phones, wrist watch, sim cards and ATM cards.

The suspects are Ibrahim Idris, aka Ibro, (who posed online as James Scott, Ibro Wire), Sadiq Idris (Lious James, Carista Sadiq), Martins Abeku (Griffen James, CBN Martins), Blessing Nicolas (Phil Nicholas), and Esther Micheal (Xta Mikelz).

The anti-graft agency said the suspects are all in their mid twenties and attending various universities both within and outside Nigeria.

"They shall be prosecuted as soon as investigation is concluded," the EFCC said.