The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) data indicates that US citizens lost over $10 billion due to phishing calls by illegal Indian call centers in 2022.
US Citizens Duped By Illegal Indian Call Centers
Notably, most of the victims of these fraud calls from Indian phishing gangs were elderly US citizens above the age of 60 years who lost over $3 billion, as per the FBI data.
The FBI has now deputed a permanent representative at the US embassy in New Delhi, citing the several incidents reported in 2022.
The representative plans to work closely with the CBI, Interpol and the Delhi Police to bust these gangs that have put India under the threat to be termed as the hub of such illegal call centers.
Billions Of Dollars Lost
During 2022, several Americans lost a total of $10.2 billion so far.
This seems to be a 47 percent increase from 2021’s $6.9 billion, to such fraud calls.
According to the FBI’s South Asia head, Suhel Daud, “romance-related” frauds reported were worth Rs 8,000 crore in 2021 and Rs 8,000 crore in the last 11 months of 2022.
When it comes to losses due to “tech support” crimes, they were as much as $3 billion in the last two years.
Out of which, $347 million in 2021 and $781 million in 2022 so far.
Further, Daus said, “It may not be a national security concern yet, but the reputation (of a country) is involved, and we don’t want India to suffer on that count,”.
The FBI’s website has registered 8.5 lakh complaints in 2021, he noted.
Further adding, over 7.8 lakh complaints so far in 2022 in regard to internet crimes.
Most of these complaints included cyber crime related to investment ($3 billion), business email compromise ($2.4 billion), personal data breach ($1.2 billion), romance ($1 billion) and tech support ($781 million).
