PANAJI
Crime Branch (CB) sleuths busted a major fake call centre racket and arrested 33 fraudsters, who impersonated Amazon Customer Service executives and cheated several customers in the US.
The CB has identified the prime as Jigar Parmar from Gujarat and 32 others including eight women; who operated from a residency at Colvale that belongs to a defeated assembly election candidate Tarak Arolkar.
“The accused impersonated the staff of Amazon Customer Service Centre. They started receiving calls from Amazon customers from the US, enquiring about their queries regarding Amazon purchases, etc through which the accused deceitfully took personal details of their victims including bank details and induced them to part with money to resolve the issue,” Superintendent of Police (CB) Nidhin Valsan said.
Investigation revealed that victim customers would thereafter deposit a certain amount into the account of the accused but never got their issues resolved. The accused persons also made calls to random customers in the US informing them that “some unknown person placed an order to purchase expensive electronic goods by hacking their Amazon account” and this modus operandi was further used to obtain details of victims.
“These details were used to further defraud the victims,” the SP said.
The accused are charged under different sections of the Indian Penal Code and Information Technology Act while 26 computers seized from the premises are sent to the forensic team for investigation.
