Police have arrested two former insurance agents on charges of using clients' personal and credit-card data to buy cash cards that they then resold for 3 million baht.
Arrested in their room on Lat Phrao Soi 107 in Bang Kapi district of Bangkok on Friday morning were Wicharn Chaiyamanee, 26, and his wife Nattha Boonthong, 31.
Officers seized 40,000 baht in cash, bank books, a computer, four mobile phones and documents containing data of credit card users.
Pol Maj Gen Suthin Sapphuang, commander of the Crime Suppression Division, said the pair had bought the credit card data of their insurance firm's clients. They then telephoned the clients and told them they would receive rebates from the insurer if they provided the three-digit security codes of their credit cards.
The suspects used the security codes, credit card numbers and personal data to buy TrueMoney cash cards and resold the cards online at discounts. The buyers of the cards transferred the money to their bank account.
Pol Maj Gen Suthin said the suspects confessed that they had made about 3 million baht from the scheme.
Crime Suppression Division officers on Friday paraded the couple before the media at a news conference, a practice that the government banned last year as a violation of suspects' rights. However, in recent weeks the ban has been ignored, judging by the number of similar events staged by the police.
Police said they were still looking for another suspect, a younger brother of Ms Nattha, as he had opened the bank account to receive money from the cash card sales.
"I would like to warn credit card users not to give any personal data related to financial transactions to anyone," Pol Maj Gen Suthin said.