This story is from April 11, 2018

Sham call centre sold payday loans to US clients, 23 held

As many as 23 people, mostly graduates, were arrested as police claimed to have busted a fake call centre in Sector 59 on Tuesday. The youths allegedly duped scores of foreigners, mostly Americans, by offering them cheap “payday loans”.
Sham call centre sold payday loans to US clients, 23 held
Along with Bhawani, five youths from Gujarat, nine from Rajasthan, four from UP, two from Gurgaon and one each from Delhi and Maharashtra have been arrested
NOIDA: As many as 23 people, mostly graduates, were arrested as police claimed to have busted a fake call centre in Sector 59 on Tuesday. The youths allegedly duped scores of foreigners, mostly Americans, by offering them cheap “payday loans”.
The call centre was being run in a building in Sector 59, rented by alleged mastermind Bhawani Singh. Police also seized 23 central processing units of computers, mobile phones, 12 debit cards and six electronic chips during the raid that was conducted following a tip-off.
Along with Bhawani, five youths from Gujarat, nine from Rajasthan, four from UP, two from Gurgaon and one each from Delhi and Maharashtra have been arrested, cops said, adding that all were aware of their involvement in a criminal activity but continued the same for a salary between Rs 10,000 and Rs 15,000 a month.

Police said the youths would call up their targets in the US on their landline numbers and leave voice mails for them, informing about offer of payday loans worth about 150 dollars, seeking a repayment of 200 dollars in lieu of the loan within six months. The voice mails sent to the targets also left toll-free number.
Payday loans are unsecured, short-term loans for a few hundred or thousand dollars in which a user pays a fee which amounts to an advance on their paychecks and are popular among Americans belonging to the economic weaker section.
When a target would call back, the callers would ask them to pay anything between 100 and 200 dollars as “file charges” for the loan.
“The callers would seek the 16-digit PIN code from their targets and share that with details of a US-based middleman who would help transfer the money to middlemen in India, who would in turn change the payment from dollars to rupees on commission basis,” said an officer.

Police said it was Bhawani, a class 12 pass-out from Nagaur in Rajasthan, who had started the fake call centre in Noida about one-and-a-half months back by employing 22 youths. “He learnt the tricks of the trade from a friend with whom he had worked in a similar call centre in Gurgaon,” said Gautam Budh Nagar SSP Ajay Pal Sharma.
“The call centre sought the services of a technician, Shambhu, who helped them design the voicemail system through which calls would land on the landline numbers of US citizens. Their contact details were bought from a US-based merchant for as low as Rs 5,000,” he added.
The SSP said that while they are looking into the mode of transaction, initial questioning has revealed that Vijay, a middleman, is in touch with someone linked to a hawala operator. “We are also retrieving the data of the number of Americans targeted by the group in the past one-and-a-half months,” he said.
Police are yet to nab technician Shambhu and middleman Vijay. “Efforts are on to arrest them,” said an officer.
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