The Delhi Police have busted a phoney international contact centre and arrested eight people for allegedly defrauding US citizens out of Rs 35 lakhs under the guise of providing tech support.
Arjun Singh Bisht, Kapil Singh Negi, Mohammed Talha, Ankit Yadav, Santosh Srivastava, Vanengmawia, Mohammed Nadir, and Aarish Baig were identified by Esha Pandey, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP), South East Delhi, on Monday.
“Secret information was received at Cyber Police Station that the fake international call centre was operating in Okhla Vihar, Jamia Nagar… A team was formed to nab the accused.
“The team raided the location where six people were found having telephonic conversations with the foreigners. After seeing the police party, they tried to escape but were overpowered by the alert team,” the DCP said.
During interrogation, the accused admitted to defrauding multiple naive people, mostly US citizens, by acting as Amazon Inc./Paypal executives.
The accused were able to have their fraudulent tech support adverts with their Virtual Toll-Free numbers displayed on top of the viewed pages using technical means.
When victims contacted them for help with a complaint or tech assistance, the accused would have a bogus anti-virus installed on their machine and get payment in the form of Amazon, Google Pay, and Target gift cards.
The defendants would then utilise Redeemer to convert the gift cards into Indian rupees.
The computer confiscated from the accused suspects has been used to verify transactions worth roughly Rs 35 lakhs, according to the inquiry so far.
(with inputs from IANS)