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Americans duped into losing $10B by illegal Indian call centres in 2022: report

timesofindia.indiatimes.com

441–450 of 504 posts

Re: Americans duped into losing $10B by illegal Indian call centres in 2022: report

#441

My uncle almost drove two states away to give a stranger $10,000 because he was duped into believing his grandson had gotten into an accident and killed a pregnant woman. The only thing that stopped it was that he first needed to borrow the money, which led to my involvement. We made some calls and were quickly able to confirm that the grandson in question was at home and nowhere near the "accident" in question. My p…

It scares me very much that these people vote and the terrible state of American politics largely reflects that. If you can’t have the forethought to call your grandson to see before giving someone $10,000, do you have the brain capacity to make an intelligent voting choice? I know this is a tangent to your comment but after seeing my parents and others their age do similar things to what you describe it makes me won…

It’s dangerous to draw lines. Where should we draw the age line? 80? 70? 60? I know people in their 70s with better cognitive abilities than the average middle age person.

In that case, let’s ask for cognitive tests to gain the right to vote! Unfortunately there will be people who will never be capable of passing the test even during their 20s or 30s. Those who cannot pass the test could be less capable thanks to the environment (poor neighborhoods, poor education, bad childhood, missing one or two parents, exposed to toxic chemicals during pregnancy) or simply less lucky in the genetic side.

Are we ready to take away the right to vote from old people even if they are more capable than you and me? If not, are we ready to take away the right to vote from less privileged people?

Re: Americans duped into losing $10B by illegal Indian call centres in 2022: report

#442

My grandfather stopped answering his landline telephone because of these scumbags. Kitboga is a youtuber who winds scammers up and wastes their time, and is pretty righteous https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNziOoXDBeg

There's a whole cottage industry of scam baiters. Harvey Dentt, Rinona Poison, Scambait Central, Lenny the robot (much less active of late), and quite a few others.

Many of them use voice filters to sound elderly, or to change genders. It seems like a lot of the scammers are getting frustrated, constantly trying to figure out if you're Kitboga, etc.

A vital service that is educating the public while providing rich entertainment.

Re: Americans duped into losing $10B by illegal Indian call centres in 2022: report

#444

A lot is caused by the forwarding services that mask the numbers. Really each should be held liable for any damages.

I think for that to be meaningful, there would need to be some mechanism to prevent fly-by-night operations formed to isolate the liability. Maybe requiring them to post a large bond (proportional to the liability) and/or have insurance?

Yeah. Robocaller fines are almost never paid. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/03/fcc-fined-roboca...

Re: Americans duped into losing $10B by illegal Indian call centres in 2022: report

#445

[flagged]

While maybe an act of war is too harsh, we should be hitting them hard economically.

It's certainly a major criminal enterprise harbored by a foreign government. What's the protocol here?

Re: Americans duped into losing $10B by illegal Indian call centres in 2022: report

#446
post #441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It scares me very much that these people vote and the terrible state of American politics largely reflects that. If you can’t have the forethought to call your grandson to see before giving someone $10,000, do you have the brain capacity to make an intelligent voting choice? I know this is a tangent to your comment but after seeing my parents and others their age do similar things to what you describe it makes me won…

It’s dangerous to draw lines. Where should we draw the age line? 80? 70? 60? I know people in their 70s with better cognitive abilities than the average middle age person. In that case, let’s ask for cognitive tests to gain the right to vote! Unfortunately there will be people who will never be capable of passing the test even during their 20s or 30s. Those who cannot pass the test could be less capable thanks to the…

We already draw a line: those under 18 can't vote. The main problem it seems is that we don't know when someone will die. /s

Re: Americans duped into losing $10B by illegal Indian call centres in 2022: report

#448

It's mind-boggling that the United States allows this kind of thing to happen. In the EU I get maybe one spam call every couple of months. From the stories you hear from Americans on HN, Americans get multiple spam/scam calls a day, and the vast majority of their inbound calls are spam/scams. What is going wrong in the US that isn't going wrong in the EU? Language barrier? Regulatory capture?

The US just has large number of people in one country code who mostly speak English, have high incomes, a uniform retail landscape ("go to CVS and get a Google Play card" works everywhere), and an abundance of options for telephony. It's not like Indian scammers are beholden to EU law but not US law.

Nope, the incentives don't work like that.

I regularly get spam calls in Chinese. My best guess is this is because if they randomly dial Bay Area area codes they sometimes get Chinese people.

Re: Americans duped into losing $10B by illegal Indian call centres in 2022: report

#449
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our phone provider has a free service, Call Control, that’s completely eliminated scam calls. Callers get an automated message asking them to enter a random number. If they enter it correctly, my phone rings as usual. This system foils automated calling services, at least for now.

The problem with services like this is that some automated calls are legitimate.

Most "legitimate" robocalls from a school or doctor's office are better off as SMS. Does an appointment reminder really need my immediate undivided attention? If it's not worth having an employee manually make the call it's probably not worth my time to answer.

Re: Americans duped into losing $10B by illegal Indian call centres in 2022: report

#450

Earlier quoted context omitted.

similar story for me a year ago. grandpa got a call that i was in jail for hitting a car and the driver was pregnant. lost her baby. they even had “me” talk to them briefly which really got em believing. he went to bank and mailed $9500 in cash, to what ultimately appeared to be an airbnb was v sad because he felt supreme humiliation over the matter.

Happened to my uncle, he records all calls so he was able to show us. When they let him speak to "his son" he sounded just like him and even used the same greeting his son normally does with him. Was very creepy. And his real son had his phone turned off during that time. The really weird bit is they didn't ask him to send any money out. They knew his address and some "police" showed up an hour later demanding he wri…

That sounds so strangely elaborate. I wonder how they fake the voice and why they bother to have a second person come to the house
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