NSE scam: SEBI can track yogi in 10-15 days says cybercrime expert

In the NSE scam, the Security and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has all that it needs to crack ‘yogi’s identity, says a cyber forensics expert.

The regulator can find this yogi within 10 to 15 days with the help of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), or within one month with the help of a constable at a nearby police station, said Nishant Singh as reported by MoneyControl.

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Nishant Singh is the Director of Forensic Investigations and Consultancy Services, and he is regularly called an expert witness in judicial proceedings involving both government and private entities.

His company has performed investigations into cooperative bank fraud, audited software used by Delhi Police academies, and conducted forensic investigations for large multinational advisory firms, such as PwC.

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Chitra Ramakrishna, the former MD and CEO of the National Stock Exchange, has been dragged into the sting by revelations she took guidance from an anonymous ‘Himalayan yogi’ to manage the enterprise, as well as having shared confidential information with him.

Despite investigating this scandal for more than four years, Sebi still cannot identify this ‘Himalayan recluse’.

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Singh added that the regulator need is the email ID of the unknown ‘yogi’, which is rigyajursama@outlook.com. From the email ID only, they can find the phone number, location and identity of the person including how many times this person has accessed this account and from where, reported MoneyControl.

To investigate the co-location scam, SEBI had hired the audit and advisory firm EY, as well as Deloitte. EY has submitted its report in 2017, which analysed the emails between Ramkrishna and the outsider-influencer.

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The firm identified the yogi as an infamous hire and former Group Operating Officer named Anand Subramanian. Sebi dismissed EY’s findings in its order of February 11, 2022, citing insufficient and contradictory evidence.

According to the regulator, EY examined only the desktops provided to Ramakrishna and Subramanian, and not the laptops assigned to the exchange and Subramanian because the devices had been discarded. Also, only the official email addresses of Ramakrishna and Subramanian were checked, not private ones.

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According to Moneycontrol, Singh said that these objections were resolvable.

First off, laptops are not necessary for tracing the identity of a yogi. The private email IDs cannot be accessed by a private entity like EY, but they can be accessed by a government investigation agency.

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Only government investigating agencies have the authority to demand details from companies that host private email IDs, such as Gmail or Yahoo.

Singh added that the CBI can find the person with the email ID only, which was used for communication between Ramakrishna and the yogi. It is easy to trace the person after getting the email through which the email is accessed. It may take some days more if the person is using proxy servers, as per the Moneycontrol report.