Thane: As many as 11 persons have been arrested for running a call centre in Wagle Estate to extract thousands of dollars out of Americans by impersonating agents of the IRS and threatening them with legal action if they did not pay a certain sum immediately using gift cards.
The police said that prime accused Haider Mansuri (29) had also been arrested in another scam call centre busted by the police in 2016 in Mira Road. He was then a close aide of Sagar Thakkar, alias Shaggy, the alleged kingpin of the call centre scam.
The IRS in the US is equivalent to the income tax department here.
On Wednesday midnight, around 50 police officials from two crime branch units and local police stations swooped down on a business park on road number 16 of the Kisannagar area in Wagle Estate and conducted a raid following a tip-off received by joint commissioner of police Datta Karale.
Karale said, “The accused posed as IRS officials and targeted US citizens. They called them up using burner phones or number spoofing phones, or voice over internet protocol, telling them that they have evaded taxes and action including arrest will follow soon. To evade any such action they asked the victims to pay through digital gift cards.”
The police said that most American citizens who got unnerved with the calls paid the scammers through gift cards numbers.
“This case is quite similar to the 2016 fake call centre, but the other aspects of the case are yet to be probed,” said a police officer….
The police said that prime accused Haider Mansuri (29) had also been arrested in another scam call centre busted by the police in 2016 in Mira Road. He was then a close aide of Sagar Thakkar, alias Shaggy, the alleged kingpin of the call centre scam.
The IRS in the US is equivalent to the income tax department here.
On Wednesday midnight, around 50 police officials from two crime branch units and local police stations swooped down on a business park on road number 16 of the Kisannagar area in Wagle Estate and conducted a raid following a tip-off received by joint commissioner of police Datta Karale.
Karale said, “The accused posed as IRS officials and targeted US citizens. They called them up using burner phones or number spoofing phones, or voice over internet protocol, telling them that they have evaded taxes and action including arrest will follow soon. To evade any such action they asked the victims to pay through digital gift cards.”
The police said that most American citizens who got unnerved with the calls paid the scammers through gift cards numbers.
“This case is quite similar to the 2016 fake call centre, but the other aspects of the case are yet to be probed,” said a police officer….
