Call centre gangs bought data of 1 lakh American citizens

Jaipur:  Two days after two gangs involved in calling up foreigners and duping them were busted, the city police revealed that the suspects had bought personal data of over 1 lakh American citizens. The gangs duped over 1,000 foreigners over the past two years.

After getting the data, the suspects would call these people and either offer them a loan or pose as Internal Revenue Service (IRS) officers. They would inform their victims about bogus tax delinquency and threaten to impose penalties. In order to avoid penalties, the victims were asked to pay them through hawala or bitcoin.

“We have come to know that this gang was being operated out of Ahemdabad. The kingpin of the gang had contacts in foreign countries. We have launched a search for the kingpin,” said a senior police officer.

The police officials said that the call center employees were provided training on how to dupe their victims in Ahemdabad. Some gang members are suspected to be based in the U.S., Australia, Canada and Hong Kong. When the victims deposited money in their bank accounts, they would transfer it to the gang members in India through hawala transactions.

“They used to call up over 200 foreigners daily. They would offer them loans at a low interest rate and made them deposit money in their bank account in the name of processing fee,” said the officer.

The accused people were running a call center out of SK Towner in Jawahar Circle and another from a flat in Indraprastha Colony. The police seized 20 computers and Rs 19.26 lakh from the Jawahar Circle-situated call center, while 5 laptops and Rs 7.21 were seized from Indraprastha-situated call center among several other things. Those arrested include a woman and belong to various places in Gujarat, UP, Nagaland and Madhya Pradesh.