As many as six hospitals in and around the city received a common hoax bomb threat email on Sunday afternoon, even as over 20 hospitals in the national capital New Delhi also received similar hoax emails the same day.
Similar hoax bomb threat emails had come to over 70 schools in and around the city on December 1, 2023 and to over 25 schools on April 8, 2022. Many schools in several cities in India and abroad have received similar hoax bomb threat emails over the last two years and the probes into these cases have hit roadblocks at least in India.
A senior police official said that those who have been targeting schools across the country, have for the first time targeted hospitals.
The hospitals who received the email are: Narayana Health City, Sagar Apollo Hospital, St. Philomena’s Hospital, St. Martha’s Hospital, Vimalalaya Multispeciality Hospital and JMJ Hospital in the city.
Following the bomb threat emails being flagged by multiple hospitals in the city on Sunday, jurisdictional police and the Bomb Detection and Disposal Squads (BDDS) swung into action, conducting a thorough search before concluding it as a hoax. Given the hoax threat emails had gone to hospitals, it posed a unique challenge as the buildings could not be evacuated completely. The BDDS carried out their checks discretely with patients in these hospitals.
“There was some panic among patients and their relatives and staffers for some time during the search operations. Though we were sure it was a hoax, we have to go through the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP),” a senior official part of the operations on Sunday said.
“We extend our sincere appreciation to the law enforcement agencies for their swift and discrete response, ensuring the safety of our facilities without causing any panic among patients, staff, or visitors,” said Narayana Health City in a statement issued on Monday.
Common email:
A common email sent to six hospitals and an email id of the Bengaluru City Police from an id courtgroup03@beeble.com at 3:06 p.m. Sunday said: “I have placed explosive devices inside your building. They will explode in the following hours. This isn’t a threat. You have a few hours to disarm the bomb or else the blood of innocent people inside of the building will be on your hands. The group called, “Court” is behind this massacre”.
The email has emerged from the domain Beeble.com, like the hoax bomb threat emails to over 70 schools in the city on December 1, 2023. Queries with Beeble.com for the user who sent the email led to the revelation that the user had used a Swiss company-run Virtual Private Network (VPN) Proton, which has a no-log policy. The probe into the case had hit a dead end there. There has been no breakthrough in the case.
City Police Commissioner B. Dayananda said the probe into the hoax bomb threat emails to hospitals in the city was transferred to the Central Crime Branch.
