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I Made an Entire Call Center Angry over Losing $94k [video]
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- naoqj 4y ago
- arcticbull 4y agoApparently a lot of the call centers are located in West Bengal AFAIK.
- thisistheend123 4y agoBeing an Indian, I can vouch for the fact that this is a South Asian accent, and very high probability that it is from either North, West or Central India. I don't know why these young people have got into this. There's plenty of opportunity to get a job in India today, if you can even read and write just a bit of English. My head hangs in shame. :(
- pm90 4y ago> My head hangs in shame. :( Why? Just because the criminal could be from India and you’re from there too? There is no need for shame; you are not responsible for the actions of everyone from your country.
- aaomidi 4y agoExactly this. Stuff like this really should be a reminder of the dark history imposed by some nations over others that just stunted their growth during the most important time of human history.
- yonixw 4y agoWhile you are correct about the shared accent, I want to point another shared property: being poor, but knowing English. In another video of his[1], a scammer decide to talk and share some really interesting facts: - He gets a monthly salary of 400$. And cents for each scam, even if the scam was of much greater sum (His example: 100$ for 20K$). - Most of the money goes to his bosses and the owner of the call center. - He actively thinking about turning them in. But since knowing English is all he can do... he won't find another job (He didn't explain, but maybe because, IT require real tech knowledge) After hearing that, I became a little bit more sympathetic towards them. They know about their wrongdoing, but keep doing it because of the economic pressure. So, While I agree we have to stop scammers.. I wish we could target the triggers who caused the humans to go there, and not the humans who got dragged into it. [1] https://youtu.be/wtjHelNSDss?t=1243 https://youtu.be/wtjHelNSDss?t=1243 (Starts at 20:43)
- pm90 4y agoYeah that is quite unfortunate. This is why economic prosperity for most humans strikes me as a very worthy goal; if this person had opportunities to do something “legit” and make ends meet, they would likely have done that.
- ourmandave 4y agoBut since knowing English is all he can do... he won't find another job (He didn't explain, but maybe because, IT require real tech knowledge) Sympathy? Yeah, no. Watch some of Kitboga vids and listen to these guys laugh while they fuck over old people. And install malware that lets them take over the victim's computer so they can remotely steal from them over and over. All while the local authorities (and up) don't lift a finger.
- arcticbull 4y agoScammer Payback is another such channel - they also share their findings with the police from time to time. It appears they do their best to head off the scammers victims by attempting to retrieve the scammers victim lists (through what appears to be mild social engineering). [1] [1] https://www.youtube.com/c/ScammerPayback https://www.youtube.com/c/ScammerPayback
- phoe-krk 4y ago> they also share their findings with the police from time to time So does Kitboga - he's been keeping in touch with fraud departments to close bank accounts whose numbers he gets from the scammers, and occasionally has people help him with OpSec so he can figure out the details of these.
- andrewclunn 4y agoReal support call centers will send you to numerous automated menus and make you jump through hoops to talk to a real person. There's going to be a heuristic adopted in a few years where real person = scammer.
- throwaway0a5e 4y agoB2B stuff is typically far more streamlined. "press 1 to reach sales, or 2 for support, if you know your party's extension dial it now"
- phoe-krk 4y agoKitboga is already a living legend for his continuous work on keeping scammers busy so they don't target other people while also providing quality and non-repetitive amusement for all of his Twitch and YouTube viewers. Leave him a subscribe on either if you'd like to see more of this. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCm22FAXZMw1BaWeFszZxUKw https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCm22FAXZMw1BaWeFszZxUKw https://www.twitch.tv/kitboga https://www.twitch.tv/kitboga
- dghughes 4y agoBeing India where the yearly income is about $2,000 USD that amount would seem closer to a million dollars in their minds.
- blamazon 4y agoAnother similar channel is Jim Browning: (a pseudonym I presume) https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBNG0osIBAprVcZZ3ic84vw https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBNG0osIBAprVcZZ3ic84vw Happy to see from thread that this is a bit of a genre. These people deserve consequences for their scams and in particular, for preying on the elderly.
- kcplate 4y agoWhenever I get these calls and have time I try to play along for a bit best I can to keep them occupied, never allowing access to my computer of course. When they start getting wise to me doing it I let them know that because they called I will now send a donation to Kitaboga, Pierogi, or Jim Browning. Usually results in a hang up, but occasionally have gotten the screaming cursing of which I laugh, which pisses them off even more.
- ourmandave 4y agoWouldn't it be nice if something could be done about these lowlifes besides relying on youtubers like Kitboga? Is there any downside or risk running a call center and draining the accounts of pensioners?
- pm90 4y agoThere is no downside. The biggest risk to the people running these scams is to get banned from the US; which they are probably fine with if they made enough money.
- mrtksn 4y agoHere in Turkey there was this "Bulgarian missed call scam" thingy. Essentially, some Turkish speaking Bulgarians(mostly roma, Bulgarians don't normally speak Turkish) would call random Turkish numbers, hoping for a middle aged or older Turkish man call them back. The scam goes like "I live in a poor Bulgarian village and my father/brother/husband treats me badly, how lucky I misdialled the phone to such a gentleman like you" and then they proceed to earn the mans trust and ask for money(first they ask for a bus ticket, then they will call back "on the way for Turkey" about something unexpected happening and ask for a large sum to be wired through Western Union). I'm Bulgaria born and I happen to have relatives where some of the scams are run at. I've seen with my own eyes people camping in front of a Western Union branch theatrically pretending that they are at the Turkish/Bulgarian border and the woman needs to pay some large fine otherwise they wouldn't let her go to Turkey. She will hand the phone to her husband who will pretend that he is a racist/fascist/gestapo Bulgarian officer asking for money or else she ain't coming to you. My relatives there told me that they even started scam courses with a week full curriculum where you pay the experienced scammers to teach you how to run the scams. They built some very nice houses in the region. Anyway, it all faded away when Bulgaria made it compulsory providing ID when you buy a new SIM(10 SIM registrations per person per year limit is introduced). Probably as a result of Turkey asking Bulgaria to locate the scammers. I heard about some still doing it by using SIMs from other countries however the heydays are gone.
- rosndo 4y agoThis story doesn’t add up. You need an ID to pick up cash from western union, why would showing an ID to get sim cards be an issue at all? Odds are that this SIM card legislation actually had nothing to do with the scam fading anyway. The village I’m from is internationally famous for internet scams, they’ve changed over the years because both the potential victims and scammers have become more savvy. Not due to legislation.
- tr4nc3 4y agoThe accent looks like either it’s from Punjab region in India or Pakistan one of the two. Good work! :-)
- SirLJ 4y agoHoly Church of The Order of The Red Breast. https://419eater.com/html/joe_eboh.htm https://419eater.com/html/joe_eboh.htm This is a classic from way back in the day…
- mattkevan 4y ago419eater is amazing. In the best threads they’re creating a global conspiracy to build a completely alternate reality around some of these scammers - false companies, websites, entire personalities. Absolutely gripping reads.
- cm2187 4y agoAt least the scammers reproduced perfectly the automated "please say what you are calling us about" that never works. I now suspect these pseudo-voice recognition systems have no other purpose than to charge more minutes on incoming customer calls and discourage the least motivated customers from calling again.
- mindslight 4y ago> charge more minutes on incoming customer calls Customer service lines are generally toll free numbers, and most callers (in the US) do not have phone plans that charge by the minute for toll free calls (paygo cell plans are really the only ones), meaning only the company is paying more. Neutrally, it's a case of Goodhart's law with no relevant metrics. There's no way to measure the frustration or satisfaction of customers - those surveys at the end of the call reflect on the person you talked to, not the overall system. But yes most likely frustration leading to hangup is seen as good. The most telling example is the ones with repeating "you can access our website", when the only reason anyone calls up these days is because they cannot accomplish their task through the website.
- ornornor 4y agoIn the US maybe. Here (Switzerland),, when you have to call a company’s customer service (usually because they messed up), you also have to pay 0.08 CHF (or rarely 1.50) per minute for the privilege.
- mindslight 4y agoI knew Europe had more call tolls, I guess I was just hopeful your customer service lines weren't as bad. (I edited my original comment to specify the US)
- beeboop 4y agoI think hold music, and especially the type that is constantly interrupted with a voice to fake you out, is also designed to be as grating as possible and make you hang up. I'm happy google added that "Hold for me" functionality to Android phones.
- vsskanth 4y agoWhy are spam and phishing phone calls still an unsolved problem ? You can't get a phone line or SIM in India without ID. shouldn't this be possible to verify and block at the telecom level ? Is there something to do with common carrier laws that prevent blocking ?
- crtasm 4y agoI assume they're all using VOIP services, not landlines.
- seanp2k2 4y agoBecause it’s not a profitable problem for telcos to solve, and telcos have lots of lobbying power to ensure Washington doesn’t make them stop. They value the pennies they get from routing these calls more than all of our financial futures combined. Good thing we have a choice and so much competition here!
- mrtksn 4y agoHow does someone in the USA makes an Indian telco disable their customer SIM or phone line? Should they just assume that the caller from America is telling the truth and drop a customer? Should Indian police detain people based on a complaint from someone from a foreign county? India is a sovereign nation, I guess the victim of the scam can seek justice at the Indian courts bu that's probably not easy or cheap too. Thee things are usually matter of international cooperation, likely wouldn't work if a scammer from France is scamming someone in Germany or scammer from Canada is scamming someone from the USA.
- theogravity 4y agoNot mentioned here is that the sites Kitboga uses are actually fakes that he coded himself to look real to the scammer. This includes banking, retail, and even the Google Play sites, which he uses to pretend he redeemed a gift card which makes scammers really angry.