Cops bust fake call centre duping US citizens online in Jaipur, 32 held

JAIPUR: The Jaipur police on Thursday busted an international fake tech-support call centre racket and arrested 32 people for cheating several elderly US citizens.
Police said the accused would send a pop-up message on the personal computers of elderly people, warning them that their operating system has been hacked.
ACP Vaishali Nagar, Alok Kumar Saini, said a phone number on the message would then direct the victims to the call centre operating in Jaipur. “The victims called the call centre in the hope of getting their computers free from the hacking malware. The accused, however, would threaten victims by claiming to have discovered that the hacked computers were earlier used for illegal activities,” Saini said, adding that the accused blackmailed elderly US citizens for money.
As per the Chitrakoot police station house officer (SHO), Gunjan Soni, the accused also have ties with suspects based in the US.
“Our primary investigation indicates that someone sitting abroad sent hacking notifications on the computers of US citizens that made their operating systems display glitch warnings,” Soni said. She said that the accused in Jaipur would tell the US citizens that their computers were being used for illegal online activities like browsing for child pornography, financial fraud, etc.
“Gullible elderly citizens would often believe these suspects. The accused then asked them to download remote access software to demonstrate that the computer was indeed hacked,” she said.
Soni said as victims pleaded for help, the accused would ask them to shell out money, which would be deposited into the bank accounts of the gang’s foreign members.
“The accused also asked these US citizens to pay through different gift cards,” she said, adding that the accused arrested from the call centre claimed that they had been working for three people: Dilip alias Sandy, Aman alias Abhay, and Deepak.
Primary investigation has revealed that the accused duped several US citizens through these online frauds.
“We have arrested 32 people and are interrogating them to find out details about their US contacts,” Soni said. Sources said forensic investigators are also examining computers used in the call center.