Fake call centre duping US citizens busted, 6 held

The police have busted a fake call centre that was allegedly duping US citizens and arrested six persons from here.

Impersonating as Internal Revenue Service (IRS) agents of the United States, these people called up people there saying they did not pay their taxes, East Khasi Hills SP Davis Marak said today. IRS is the tax collection agency of the USA.

These call centre people asked the US citizens to pay tax or face jail terms, Marak said adding their tax details had been collected from certain websites.

It appeared that the call centre asked the intended victims to pay their 'tax' in a particular way, and after they paid, half of the money is brought to India via hawala channel and a share of it was given to these people operating in Shillong.

The lion's share, however, would go to the main heads of the racket based in Ahmedabad, he said.

Following a tip off, the police started raiding a rented premises near the RBI here and some other places last night and busted the fake call centre, Marak said.

Over 100 computers, a server, seals and documents were seized during the raids.A full fledged investigation is on into the case, teh SP said.