National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency (NCCIA) Additional Director Shahzad Akbar said on Thursday that the agency arrested 273 people, including more than 100 women and 42 underage boys and girls, during a major crackdown on an alleged cyber fraud network operating in Karachi. Addressing a press conference at the NCCIA Karachi Office, Akbar said the arrests were made from a call centre located in PECHS, located alongside Shahrah-e-Faisal. “The agency also seized 3,390 laptops, 152 mobile phones and four CPUs during the raid,” he said. The additional director further said that the forensic examination of the seized laptops and CPUs revealed that individuals based abroad were also involved in the company's scamming operations, while merchants were also part of the fraud network. He said multiple user IDs registered under different names were found logged into individual laptops. Read: IHC orders regularisation of FIA-NCCIA staff He outlined that the illegal call centres were allegedly obtaining citizens' personal data and using it in various fraudulent schemes. Responding to a question, Akbar said this was the first time that employees, along with the company owner, had been nominated in a case. He explained that previously, cases were registered only against company owners, while their relatives would register new companies and resume operations with the same employees. The NCCIA official further disclosed that approximately 350 call centres in Karachi were currently involved in scamming activities. He added that the company targeted in the latest raid was among the top three call centres involved in scamming operations in the provincial capital. Court grants NCCIA two-day remand of nine suspects in the case Earlier today, a judicial magistrate granted the NCCIA a two-day physical remand of nine key suspects arrested during the raid. The suspects were produced before Judicial Magistrate East Gulraiz Memon through a video link, while the NCCIA investigating officer appeared in court and submitted a notification issued by the Sindh Home Department. The investigating officer told the court that 273 suspects had been arrested during the operation and were being detained at the call centre premises, which the Home Department had declared a sub-jail through a notification. Read more: NCCIA arrests accused in $126m US postal fraud According to the investigating officer, the suspects were allegedly involved in defrauding foreign nationals, and he sought physical remand of nine key suspects for further investigation and requested that the remaining accused be sent to jail on judicial remand. During the proceedings, defence counsel informed the court that the arrested individuals included more than 70 juveniles and over 80 women. The lawyer argued that the offences included in the case were bailable and requested that the female and underage suspects be released on bail. After hearing the arguments, the court granted the NCCIA a two-day physical remand of nine main suspects. The court also ordered the release on bail of female suspects and those below the age of 18 against surety bonds of Rs5,000 each. The remaining suspects were ordered to be sent to jail on judicial remand. Call centre raid At around 8-9pm, the NCCIA raided a call centre, Voxtron, located in PECHS near Shahrah-e-Faisal in Karachi on November 3, eyewitnesses told The Express Tribune. A detainee’s brother said his brother went to the office on Tuesday and was not allowed to leave the next day. He said he approached the police officials at the site on November 4 to enquire about his brother, who told him that he was arrested during the ongoing raid at the facility. “They told me that a first information report (FIR) has been registered against all employees of the call centre and the magistrate will now decide about their future,” he said, adding that they refused to provide a copy of the FIR. Also Read: Mohsin Naqvi orders intensified crackdown on cybercrime A relative of another detainee told The Express Tribune that the 15-year-old company was raided twice earlier as well, but no legal steps were taken against the owner. “The authorities were aware that minors up to the age of 12 were working inside the company, and yet the operation continued undeterred. Where was the labour department and the rest of the authorities at that time? Where was the rule of law?” he questioned, saying that he represented the crowd of heirs gathered outside the call centre who have similar questions. An uncle of a 17-year-old boy detained by NCCIA lamented that the authorities had refused to give the families the FIR registered against the company employees. “They should have let us have it so that we could get our children freed,” he protested. He too questioned why the call centre fraud did not attract the attention of the authorities for over a decade. The mother of a young woman told The Express Tribune that she had no contact with her daughter allegedly detained at the company since November 3. “I have no idea if she was given food and water in detention. The authorities have kept us in the dark.”