Woman arrested in Malaga town of Fuengirola for defrauding €64,000 and money laundering

A 49-year-old woman has been arrested on suspicion of defrauding €64,000 and money laundering in the Costa del Sol town of Fuengirola.

As reported in a statement from the Provincial Police this Sunday, April 30, a woman was arrested in the Malaga town of Fuengirola. She is allegedly responsible for the crimes of fraud and money laundering.

These would have been committed against two companies through the so-called ‘man in the middle’ method. According to the investigators, the woman allegedly made contacts and malicious operations to gain access to the victim’s bank accounts and communications.

She would have also intercepted economic information and manipulated the data in order to obtain, in this case, some €64,000 using this modus operandi.

An investigation was launched back in March, following a complaint from the representatives of two companies that had been victims of a scam using computer systems.

Their bank details had apparently been accessed by somebody impersonating one of the companies. That individual subsequently intercepted several transfers, in such a way that they managed to divert €64,000 from payments being made.

The first steps taken by the investigating National Police officers were to determine that they were dealing with a scam whose modus operandi is known as ‘man in the middle’.

In this type of scam, ‘the man in the middle’, i.e. a cybercriminal, maliciously accesses the data of companies’ invoices pending payment. They then change the numbering of the bank account to divert the payments to other accounts managed by the criminal network.

With such a scam, the ultimate objective is usually to obtain the personal data of the victims. They are then fraudulently contacted and the criminals manage to become the recipients of the transfers and/or payments issued by that person or company.

In this specific case, the fraudster intercepted communications between two companies and was able to find out that one of them was going to make payments of more than €60,000.

The investigations carried out led to the identification of the alleged perpetrator. She was a 49-year-old woman, a resident of the Costa del Sol town of Fuengirola. Police officers located and arrested her as the alleged perpetrator of the crimes of fraud and money laundering.

Allegedly, this woman received the transfers in a bank account which she immediately retransferred to other accounts under her control. The detainee has already been handed over to the Court of Instruction No.3 in Fuengirola, as reported by laopiniondemalaga.es.