A large number of cellphones have also been recovered from the accused.
Seven people have been arrested and over 16,000 SIM cards recovered from them when police busted an alleged cybercrime syndicate at Cuttack in Odisha.
Commissioner of Police, Bhubaneswar-Cuttack, S K Priyadarsi told news agency ANI, "A cybercrime syndicate was busted with the arrest of 7 people including two service providers who were creating pre-activated SIMs and sending them outside the state in exchange for money. Over 16,000 SIMs (were) recovered. These SIMs were created using fake IDs."
Visuals show that a large number of cellphones have also been recovered from the accused.
Usually, a SIM card is only activated after we obtain it from a service provider by submitting identity documents. SIM cards that have been activated beforehand are preferred by criminals as they cannot be traced back to them.
The demand for such SIM cards has only grown with the rise in cybercrimes, including economic offences and frauds.
As per the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data released last year, the year 2019 saw a 63.5 per cent rise in cyber crime cases as compared to the previous year.