The story is about a global scam that uses instant loan apps to entrap and humiliate people across India and other countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. The scam involves harvesting borrowers' contacts, photos, and ID cards, and then using that information to extort them into repayment. When borrowers don't repay on time, or even when they do, scammers share this information with a call center where agents are trained to harass and humiliate them. The scam is particularly devastating in India, where at least 60 people have killed themselves after being abused and threatened.
Till a few years back (I am not sure if they still do), banks and finance companies would use heavy-handed methods in order to collect debt. If you go back further in time when there was very little organized lending, farmers would be at the mercy of money lenders. I guess all this has migrated to loan apps with the added bonus of "nudes."
The problem is, desperate people will borrow from anyone under any terms. If it is not this, then it would be some local "moneylender" with muscle.
Wow. Wild that people surely know about these extortions, and they still ostracize the victims who are their acquaintances. It almost doesn’t make sense that anyone would pay attention to the deepfakes. It’s even wilder that in light of all the evidence this generates, the call centers are allowed to exist. Finally, I can’t believe that the people in these call centers laugh and enjoy extorting others. So many things are deeply rotten in a society that allows this.
They don't really have a caste system anymore, and haven't for a while.
At least one of the Founding Fathers of India (who authored
the Constitution) as well as the current Commander in chief equivalent are both "low caste" background, as are plenty of other high profile important folks.
The only reason the caste system exists is to enable reservations (kind of like affirmative action).
And finally, caste in and of itself was something introduced by the Portuguese. The original term was Varna, and it denoted your occupation/subject matter expertise. You could change your Varna, but usually you didn't do this because the opportunity cost was pretty high in the past.
However, all Varnas were considered important, whether it was military, trade, farming, or sweeping the street. I'm sure that there was prejudice, just as many on Hacker News in First World Western countries are prejudiced towards those in the Second and Third worlds, or a stockbroker may be prejudiced against the person making his McDonald's.
Many of my Indian friends still say they're affected by the caste system. It is legally prohibited, but it exists in practice and it prescribes social interactions, marriage, and employment in various regions and communities. This is not to say that it is not being actively challenged, just to say that it exists de facto.
