Scamsters scale China wall

What happens when fraudsters them selves are duped? If they are Gujaratis, they are sure to find a solution matching their enterprise.

Investigation by the city crime branch of the extensive call centre racket has revealed how a group from the state went to China despite zero knowledge of Chinese and without a shred of familiarity with the country. This group forged a connection in China after a few trusted allies swindled its money.

The city crime branch officials said for the first time in India, China-based processors used iTunes cards and gave up to 70% money back to the con call centre operators.

Payment processing: backbone of the business

Multiple teams of the crime branch, led by JCP J

K Bhatt

, DCP Deepan Bhadran and ACP Rajdeepsinh Zala, have so far established the lead providers, call centre owners, callers, VoIP minutes providers, and logistics experts associated with the scam. However, the most important players in the racket became known after the arrest of Thomas Patel, 28, who worked as a payment processor. His arrest led police to Maulik Trivedi, Dipak Asudani and later Aakash Vadhvani and Ruchir Andharia alias `R Bhai', natives of Bhavnagar. “Call centre operators got around 55% of the money,“ said an investigator. “The reason was the difficulty in routing money and hiding the trail.“ He said, typically, processors overseas used to take over 30% whereas another 15% was paid to various levels of processors in India. “The blank portion so far was the 30% component,“ he said. “Confessions of Akash, Ruchir, Dipak and Maulik filled the gap by pointing at China.“

The thriving business

Police cracked down on con call centres in the city only after Thane Police visited a few call centres in Ahmedabad in connection with a multi-crore scam and a US court handed an indictment in the

Internal Revenue Service

(IRS -the US tax department) scam. The indictment named five city-based call centres and multiple players including Sagar Thakar as accused. The first raid on such a call centre took place in mid-November in

Chandkheda

. The city crime branch named five other call centres involved in illegal operations, operating from areas such as Vastrapur and Satellite. The Vastrapur-based call centres are believed to have had a daily turnover of over US $10,000.

Callers impersonated IRS officers and threatened US citizens to pay nonexistent tax arrears.

Money managers

“Maulik and Ruchir, during another visit, opened bank accounts in China and

Hong Kong

,“ said an investigator. “So far, we have got details of 125 accounts with

Agricultural Bank of China

containing over Rs 10 crore. Only six to eight accounts were opened by the group whereas others are found to have transactions within the bank for transfers.“ The visits opened the new payment highway on which on one side there were iTunes card numbers received from US citizens getting duped. On the other side were payments in dollars and yuan. Officials believe that the foreign currency was used by a few Indian businessmen for purchase of Chinese goods. In return, they gave Indian currency to the operators back home, completing the circle.Due to the network, the accused identified as payment processors may be involved in more call centre scams.

The Chinese puzzle

Scamsters had to depend on Chinabased `vendors' to redeem iTunes cards -the numbers of which they received from victims. “The cards can be used only to purchase Apple products such as music tracks, books, movies, applications and games,“ said an investigator.“Thus, the developers or `vendors' used to redeem the cards for making purchases and getting the money from Apple. After getting their cut, they would forward the amount to the fraudsters.“ The team including Maulik, visited Guangdong and bargained hard to get the best deal.

FBI help to be sought

Crime branch officials said that they have already written to the ministry of home affairs (MHA) to seek the support of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to get video statements of the scam victims -on the basis of the records recovered from the call centres. The US indictment has mentioned a number of persons of Indian and probably Gujarati origin who have lost money to the fraudsters over the past two years.

Calls and smoke

Crime branch officials said that numerous hookah bars on the SG Road worked as networking points for the call centre professionals. Of 30-odd accused caught so far, only two to three have no connections with hookah bars. The reason, said investigators, is that the bars operated till early hours before the recent police crackdown. Thus, many used to throng it during early morning hours to get a drag and meet fellow callers or closing experts.

English bowled them all

Investigators said that barring a few, none of the accused are fluent in English.Most have working knowledge but they couldn't hold conversations. “Most of the accused arrested are callers as closures are performed only by experts who could go beyond the script and threaten US citizens in stern and authoritative language,“ said an investigator, adding that none of the call centre owners or payment processors are fluent in the language even though their operations hinged on it.“Most could read the given script for the call. It was one reason why the call centre in Chandkheda got youths from northeastern states whereas call centres in Vastrapur got experts from Thane after the crackdown in Maharashtra.“

IRS warning didn't help

First reported in early 2015, the IRS scam is so widespread that IRS had to issue multiple warnings and notices asking citizens not to get duped by the calls. The IRS explained that it never worked that way. However, as victims recount their horrors online, it appears that the IRS warning was not heeded by many. A student from Connecticut had told media in October 2016 that she was forced to pay US $7,900 for not paying `federal student tax' which does not exist. The victim said that the callers had all the information related to her and thus she was compelled to believe that the caller was a federal officer. In another account documented in the US indictment, a woman from California was threatened of immediate deportation and court action if she failed to pay the dues. She lost US $16,000. Police investigators don't deny a good number of NRIs were victims as they become easy prey due to their fear of deportation.