Reporting snapshot · 23 September 2026. Pakistan's National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency (NCCIA) said on Tuesday that it had raided three alleged illegal call centres in Islamabad's E-11 and G-10 sectors over the preceding 24 hours, detaining 212 Pakistani and Chinese men and women on suspicion of involvement in an international online fraud network. The account rests on the agency's statement as reported by the Associated Press of Pakistan and on independent coverage by Dawn and The Express Tribune. The investigation is at an early stage: the alleged links to India and Brazil, the scale of any financial losses and the roles of individual suspects are preliminary and remain unproven. This is a dated snapshot, not a live tracker.
What happened
The National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency (NCCIA) said on Tuesday that its Islamabad unit had raided three alleged illegal call centres over the previous 24 hours, detaining 212 people and seizing hundreds of electronic devices in a case it is treating as an international online fraud network. An agency spokesperson said the raids targeted call centres established in Sectors E-11 and G-10 of the federal capital, and that those taken into custody included Chinese and Pakistani men and women.
The scale of the operation was substantial. The NCCIA said it recovered 306 mobile phones, 383 computers or CPUs and 299 monitors and laptops from the premises, all of which have been transferred to its laboratory for forensic analysis. In G-10, the agency said it raided two of the three call centres and that Pakistani women were among those detained. Because of the number of people held, the call centre premises were declared a sub-jail for legal proceedings, according to the Associated Press of Pakistan. A case has been registered against 212 suspects, including seven Chinese nationals, and the investigation is continuing to determine the network’s operations, its financial links and the role of each suspect.
The agency framed the operation as part of a wider drive against illegal call centres. NCCIA Director General Syed Ali Nasir Rizvi said elements involved in illegal call centres and cyber fraud deserved no leniency, that protecting citizens’ data and assets was the agency’s top priority, and that operations against cybercrime would continue “without discrimination” under a zero-tolerance policy.
The alleged fraud methods
The NCCIA spokesperson said the suspects allegedly used a range of methods to target people online, including Google-related fraud, loan and dating schemes, fake social media profiles and fraudulent trading offers. Dawn reported that preliminary investigations pointed to “tasking fraud” and “love or dating scams” in which the suspects posed as Google representatives to swindle money from people.
The methods match a pattern Pakistani authorities have described repeatedly in recent months. Investigators said the network was found to have links to India and Brazil, and that data was being transferred abroad. Both the extent of those links and the actual losses involved remain under investigation, and the agency has not yet published the identities of the suspects or the specific platforms involved. The NCCIA deputy director told Arab News that investigators found the systems still running when they entered the premises, and that an FIR had been registered before the seized equipment was sent for forensic analysis.
Not the first such crackdown
Tuesday’s raid is one of several large call-centre operations Pakistani agencies have conducted this year. In August, the NCCIA raided a call centre and an illegal digital centre in Sparco Plaza in Islamabad’s Gulberg Greens area and arrested 114 foreign nationals, including 111 Chinese and three Vietnamese citizens, over an alleged cyber-romance and sextortion network operating from a registered IT business. In December 2025, the agency dismantled an organised international online fraud network in Karachi, arresting 34 suspects including 15 foreign nationals, in an operation involving fake investment platforms and more than 10,000 foreign SIM cards. Last week, the NCCIA arrested 27 suspects, including four Afghan nationals, in a Karachi operation against an international scam call centre whose operators allegedly posed as authorised representatives of financial institutions to obtain personal and financial information through spoofed calls.
The frequency of the operations points to the scale of the problem Pakistan’s law-enforcement agencies say they are confronting. The NCCIA, established to protect digital infrastructure and enforce cyber laws, has been pursuing a range of cybercrime cases this year, including a gang accused of selling government officers’ data abroad. The government has also been tightening the broader rules of the road for digital services: earlier this month it issued a cyber-security handbook for officials that, among other things, bars feeding sensitive data to public artificial-intelligence tools.
What is still uncertain
The most important unknowns are who exactly ran the network, how many victims there were and how much money changed hands. The NCCIA has said the initial investigation indicates links to India and Brazil and that data was transferred abroad, but those are preliminary findings and none of the allegations has been tested in court. The agency has not said whether any of the detainees have been formally charged beyond the registered FIR, and the seven Chinese nationals identified so far are suspects, not convicted persons.
It is also unclear how the operation fits into the broader enforcement picture. The NCCIA has described the raids as part of a continuing crackdown on illegal call centres, and its director general has promised further action. Whether this marks an escalation in enforcement, how the cases proceed through the courts, and what the forensic examination of the seized devices reveals will determine the significance of Tuesday’s operation. For now, the raids stand as a large and publicly announced step in an ongoing campaign against call-centre fraud that has repeatedly surfaced in Pakistani enforcement actions over the past year.
Sources & reporting notes
This is a synthesis of published material, not eyewitness reporting. Sources were reviewed on 23 September 2026. The account rests on the NCCIA's statement as reported by the Associated Press of Pakistan and on independent reports by Dawn and The Express Tribune; the alleged India-Brazil links, the fraud methods and the roles of the suspects are preliminary investigation findings.
- Associated Press of Pakistan — NCCIA raids three illegal call centres in Islamabad, 212 held in international fraud probe22 September 2026 · Primary account of the NCCIA statement: the three raids in E-11 and G-10, the 212 detainees including seven Chinese nationals, the seized equipment, the sub-jail declaration and the registered case.
- Dawn — NCCIA cracks down on network allegedly linked to India, Brazil23 September 2026 · Independent report of the operation, the "tasking fraud" and "love or dating scams" allegations, the India-Brazil links, the data-transfer claim and the director general's zero-tolerance statement.
- The Express Tribune — Over 200 detained for 'online scam'23 September 2026 · Independent confirmation of the 212 detentions, the recovered devices and the alleged fraud methods including Google-related fraud, loan and dating schemes and fake profiles.
