Police mole helped bust call centre scam

The Thane district court on Friday granted police custody up to October 10 to the 70 people arrested in the Mira Road call centre scam.

The police has found that 770 people worked at the seven call centres involved in the scam. It had arrested 70 employees on Tuesday and Wednesday for allegedly threatening US citizens for extortion and siphoning off their money. These staffers would pose as the US Internal Revenue Service officials and fraudulently transfer funds.

Deputy Commissioner of Police Parag Manere told Business Standard, "The police have arrested half of the main accused and the remaining will soon be nabbed. It is a clear case of cheating, extortion and impersonation."

The raids at seven call centres in Mira Road and the arrest of 70 came after the Thane police received information of suspicious activity at one such establishment.

The police deployed a mole at one of these call centres for a fortnight. He worked part-time at the call centre, collected evidence by observing the operations, including calls made in American accent, which helped the police build evidence. After that, a police team comprising 200 personnel raided calls centres called Universal Services, I Serve BPO, Tech Solutions and Call Tech Solutions. Investigations have revealed these were illegal and unregistered entities.

Recruitment was done through posters or handbills calling for a walk-in interview to fill an urgent requirement in an international BPO for US collection and technical process. The criteria for selection was good communication skills and the education requirement was Class X. A comprehensive training programme was conducted by about eight accused.

These recruits would get intensive accent training from experts to speak to US citizens. The starting salary was Rs 25,000, which went up to Rs 60,000. Employees who made more number of calls and succeeded in extorting more money were paid higher bonuses. Call centre employees were trained to ask 23 questions.

A crime branch officer said the police would soon inspect the 851 hard disks seized from the call centres, rope in information technology consultants and carry out forensic testing. "Since the arrest of 70 persons, we have been receiving calls from the relatives of victims from the US. We will seek further details from them for further investigations."

Nearly 6,500 US citizens are believed to have been scammed into paying between $500 and $60,000 each to avoid criminal investigation and legal battle.