
Inside the TalkTalk 'Indian scam call centre' - dberhane
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-39177981
======
jeena
I've been called by some "Windows support" three times during last month. The
first time I didn't have the time to talk to them but the second time I took
the time to do so.

Somehow, even though I don't have a windows computer, I was able to fake it
for about 10 minutes that I am following his instructions and doing what he
tells me. First I had to press Win+r, which I didn't really know what it did,
but I suspected it opened the CMD, so I told him that a new window opened, a
black one. Then he spelled to me what I should write (I don't remember what, I
didn't have anything to write with me).

Then he asked me if I had Chrome installed, I said yes and he spelled a
website url to me. I told him that it loaded and there was a "Download" button
and asked if I should click it. He said yes. Then he talked me through how to
install it, from his description I got that it was TeamViewer.

He told me to start it, bare in mind that this was painfully slow for both of
us because I had to come up with plausible mistake to make and had to think of
some plausible but generic answers on the way because he always asked me what
I'm seeing on the streen now. After I "started" it I had to tell him that in
fact I didn't have a computer in front of me, but I only was playing along
with his script.

He stopped for a couple of seconds and then he asked me:

"How is this possible ...? Why are you waisting my time??"

~~~
pwython
> "How is this possible ...? Why are you waisting my time??"

That's actually not so bad. I got a different, more hilarious response when a
scammer realized I was stringing him along. Which I recorded.

I received a call just last Thursday from a professionally recorded American
sounding female voice saying it was my credit card company. "Nothing was wrong
with my account" but there was an opportunity to reduce my interest rate on
EITHER my "MasterCard" OR "Visa." I knew this was going to be fun so I played
along, pressed 1, and got connected to a guy from India. He began by asking
for my credit card number to verify my account.

I started recording half way through, hoping to keep him on longer but failed.
Here's the short clip from when he realized I was giving him random credit
card numbers (NSFW language):

[https://instaud.io/Niz](https://instaud.io/Niz)

~~~
chrisper
>I received a call just last Thursday from a professionally recorded American
sounding female voice saying it was my credit card company.

I get those too. Also ones that say they are from Mariott Hotel or something.
They always use local phone numbers, so I always pick up :(

But I hang up right away anyway.

~~~
rexf
Super annoying, I've been getting many of the Marriott calls from a local
number (408) lately. Not sure what I can do besides not pick up unknown local
calls.

------
ikeboy
Dell support has a similar issue. Relatives of mine have been contacted by
people claiming to be from Dell support soon after the person actually opened
a case with support (so someone has ongoing access to the Dell database). The
scammer had the tag of the computer, which I confirmed was correct.

They basically said to check the error log of Windows with instructions. There
are always some benign errors, which they'll tell you are proof there's
something wrong, and then try to get you to download software to fix it.

Edit: see [https://arstechnica.com/security/2016/01/latest-tech-
support...](https://arstechnica.com/security/2016/01/latest-tech-support-scam-
stokes-concerns-dell-customer-data-was-breached/) and
[https://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/02/dell-to-customers-
report...](https://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/02/dell-to-customers-report-
service-tag-scams/)

~~~
Already__Taken
The only bit of fake delivery tracking scam I've received was suspiciously
right after I ordered a Dell XPS back in 2013. It had some details close
enough that I had to message dell to confirm a tracking number and they hadn't
shipped it yet.

------
bhouston
Key point - because they outsourced a call center to India, the customer data
of TalkTalk was stolen along with their customer care scripts. This was then
used to setup a fraudulent call center in India that has been scamming their
customers - brutal:

> In 2011, TalkTalk outsourced some of its call-centre work to the Kolkata
> (Calcutta) office of Wipro, one of India's largest IT service companies.

> Last year, three Wipro employees were arrested on suspicion of selling
> TalkTalk customer data.

> A source in Kolkata, who did not want to be named, alleges the same data was
> obtained by a criminal gang, with USB sticks full of data trading hands at
> parties.

~~~
willvarfar
If they had been TalkTalk employees, in India, it could still have happened.

If they had been TalkTalk employees, in the UK or any other country, it could
still have happened.

It doesn't seem that its _because they outsourced a call centre to India_ , or
even _because they outsourced a call centre_ , but rather _because three call
centre employees were corrupt_.

Anyone following the UK news knows there are plenty of insider-jobs happening
on-shore too.

~~~
cmdrfred
Certainly you agree that its easier to get something like this done in India
though? Roughly half of the population[0] there has paid a bribe at some point
in time.

[0][https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_in_India](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_in_India)

~~~
delecti
Certainly that's not a good sign, but I don't find that statistic nearly as
interesting as the (apparently unmentioned) proportion of the population who
has accepted a bribe. If _paying_ a bribe is only the way to get things done,
then doing so is just trying to move through the system. In a corrupt system,
_accepting_ a bribe is the sign that an individual is themselves corrupt.

~~~
madez
Besides the fact that in India corruption and scam is a common and widespread
problem, accepting a bribe is certainly worse than giving one. Sometimes you
just don't have any other option than giving a bribe, while the one accepting
the bribe most often has.

------
greatartiste
My wife used to be a Talk Talk customer in the days of dial ins. Anyway 5 or
so years back they suddenly started billing her credit card again monthly for
the service she had cancelled years before. We couldn't stop this online as
their system claimed no knowledge of her so I had to call the support numbers
listed on the Talk Talk website. These went through to the usual Indian call
centre but what went on there was very unusual. The first operator wanted my
wife to post him her VISA statements to his home address (as they would get
lost in the post if we sent them to Talk Talk). Another call brought an
operator who said he could only trace what had happened if my wife gave him
her VISA number and CVV over the phone !! I tried to call their Fraud
Prevention office but got another Indian who wanted a VISA number before we
could proceed.

After multiple calls one day a call was answered by an Irish voice who was
very apologetic and arranged a refund which arrived a few days later. Attempts
to tell Talk Talks UK office about this went no where as all calls seemed to
go to the same Indian call centre.

Since I have read that Talk Talk had closed their Irish call centre for
reasons of cost and now all support is from their Indian call centres. Avoid
this company at all costs.

------
bjourne
Someone tipped me about "Lenny":
[https://www.youtube.com/user/ToaoDotNet/videos?view=0&sort=p...](https://www.youtube.com/user/ToaoDotNet/videos?view=0&sort=p&flow=grid)
I'd love to know if it is possible to route calls from outside the US to him!

~~~
iicc
[https://www.reddit.com/r/itslenny/](https://www.reddit.com/r/itslenny/)

> Instructions for use:

> Transfer, conference, or forward your telemarketing calls to 1-347-514-7296
> or sip:13475147296@in.callcentric.com. If you conference Lenny in, be sure
> to mute your phone. The rules: Lenny is for incoming, telemarketing calls
> only - not for annoying people, even if they deserve it.

>Testing/experimental calls are fine, as long as they don't bother anyone.

~~~
bjourne
I tried it and the recording says Lenny doesn't accept international calls.

------
desireco42
I've been repeatedly called with 'Support Scam' where they trick you into
installing sw that lets them monitor and control your computer. I don't
remember this being as prevalent as before. Clearly it is profitable and they
are finding enough targets to warrant operations.

~~~
chiph
My father fell for this scam. As you get older, you lose patience with
computers, so he developed a tendency to click on anything to get browser
popups to just go away. One of them was a "Your computer is infected and we
have the cure" scam. His info was passed to their "customer care desk" which
took him for $300 to supposedly clean his PC. They would regularly call back
for subscription renewals (more $$$).

I didn't find out until it had been going on for a few years, because dad
didn't want to bother me with his computer problems. Make sure you inform your
parents about this - they're easy marks for these assholes.

~~~
desireco42
Sorry to hear for your dad. Definitely majority of population is not capable
to handle all the details modern tech is requiring.

I do blame modern tech for that.

~~~
chiph
Thanks - I do miss him.

I think if someone were to come up and knock on their front door, most older
people wouldn't hesitate to send them away (exceptions for Girl Scout cookies,
of course). But when a fraudster arrives via computer screen, they don't
recognize the same threat. They believe what they see on a computer screen
because well, _it 's a computer_ and everyone knows they don't make mistakes.

------
mhw
I'm a TalkTalk customer, and was on the receiving end of this scam last year.
I'm savvy enough to know that all the machines on our network were unlikely to
be suffering from the problems they tried to describe (only one Windows
laptop, and that was dual boot with Linux and carefully used).

The most annoying thing (for us) was that they repeatedly called the home
number at random intervals through the day until we actually picked up, and
then you'd get complete silence most of the time. When they finally managed to
get someone on the phone on their end it was easy enough to tell them they
were scammers and get rid of them, but I can see how those who are less
confident around technology could easily be taken in by them.

~~~
acomjean
"you'd get complete silence most of the time"

This is caller software. They figured it was too wasteful to have operators
waiting for the phone for you to answer, so a machine dials you and when you
answer its supposed to patch you into an operator. Obviously if they're are
more calls then operators, you wait, or just hang up....

~~~
eric_the_read
My (least) favorite variant of this is the telemarketers who wait for you to
say "hello", then, after they quickly conference in the actual operator, they
say, "Oh! Sorry, I was having a problem with my headset. Anyway, I'd like to
ask you about..."

------
siddharthdeswal
So yeah, I knew someone who worked at a place like this in their previous job.
For him, it was just a job that paid really well. He frequently made more than
Rs. 1 lakh per month, which is kind of a big deal in India when you're just a
year or so out of an average, run of the mill college.

Generally, these 'call centres' train employees to think that Americans are
really stupid people who can be scared & fooled easily. Given the commissions
he made, they were damn good at it, specially with the older people who would
pay fairly large amounts every month or so to keep their computers virus free.

He never thought he was in some scammy company though. For him, the callers
were 'virus' hit users who were calling to get their computers repaired, and
these guys just had to make quick, easy, FUD driven upsells.

Oh, and these guys are unhappiest when they are made the manager, who get a
very small commission from their team's upsells. I guess this meant that no
one was looking for 'career growth'.

------
codedokode
I wonder is not it bank's responsibility to refund the money that were stolen
from customer's account? And don't they use SMS messages to confirm outgoing
payments?

But this case shows also that Internet banking UI are too complicated for some
people and they don't realise what they are doing when following scammers'
instructions.

------
mpswardle
I got called by these guys last month. It was immediately obvious something
was amiss as the line quality was absolutely dreadful, like virtually
inaudible.

The lady on the other end said i had been identified as someone from TalkTalk
who would be having problems with my internet speed and they could help.

She then asked me what OS i run, when i said OS X she hung up.

------
neilwilson
I happened to have the 400 series http errors open when one of these chappies
rang up. I think I got to 'Request, Time Out' before he twigged.

------
user_rob
TalkTalk need to do more to fix this issue as they were responsible for not
keeping customer information secure. Admittedly they did give out free stuff
last year as a sort of compensation. However if this annoyance is not resolved
soon TalkTalk's reputation will slide further.

------
duracel
I can't believe how these companies do not get busted ever ? Englang is really
unfair country for small business owners. More bigger corporation, less they
pay tax, less they care of customers, less they protect your data...

------
st3v3r
We need to find this place, and issue drone strikes as soon as possible. If
that is the only thing that Trump does with the rest of his presidency, he
will go down as a better president than Obama.

------
EJTH
Tech scamming is an interesting phenomenon to say the least...

I have been binge watching scambaiters on youtube recently. I can highly
recommend it if you want an introduction to how these scammers work.

