In the age of technology in the twenty-first century, "telecommunications fraud" is undoubtedly the most scorned crime of mankind: unscrupulous fraudsters hide on the other side of the telephone line and use rhetoric to deceive trust. They target middle-aged and elderly people who do not understand the Internet, and rob innocent people of their savings without a bottom line.
These phone scammers don't even need to show up to wreak havoc on a family. No one doesn't hate them, but unfortunately the victims have a hard time doing anything to them.
This is because most telecommunications fraud is committed internationally. Domestically, most of the scam calls come from Southeast Asia. For European and American countries, India is the largest industrial park for telecommunications fraud.
According to a report released by the United States last year, in just one year, Telecom fraudsters in India stole nearly $20 billion from Europe and the United States.
However, because the fraud team in India is professional and well-organized, and only engages in transnational crimes, the US police are helpless to do anything about it, and the victims are even more miserable.
Until a few chivalrous guests came forward and sanctioned them with magical means-
Not long ago, the office of an Indian fraud group was attacked by several unidentified objects, namely stinky fart gas, cockroaches, rats, and even Viagra...
This is a justice trial that several YouTube bloggers have worked so hard to complete. Although it did not cause much damage, it was very effective.
And behind this seemingly childish attack, there is actually a wonderful process comparable to a spy war movie...
Indian scams are infested with groups, and the chivalrous guests who sanctioned them this time are also a clear division of labor.
The justice squad is made up of multiple YouTube bloggers, one of whom is led by Jim Browning.
Jim is a well-known blogger on the Internet for "Fighting Telecom Fraud", and he has been working in this field alone for decades. His account has millions of followers, and the content is all about telecom fraud.
Relying on various hacking methods, Jim has dealt a lot of blows to the Indian fraud team. For example, he has sabotaged the dialing system of a large number of fraud teams; anti-human flesh out the address information of the fraud team and pretended to be a "ghost" to answer the fraudulent call, while accurately calling out the real name of the caller; hacking into the computer of the fraudster and installing a voice changer with a cartoon rat tone...
Spoofing the scam gang while watching the surveillance is Jim's unique skill
Under the long-term execution of justice, Jim has become familiar with the evil industry of telecommunications fraud in India, and he also has the evidence of the crimes of many telecommunications fraud agencies.
His position in the Indian fraud industry is equivalent to that of Batman in Gotham City.
But like Batman, Jim's personal strength, no matter how powerful, is slightly weak in the face of a well-established criminal gang. He has repeatedly submitted his compiled information to the Indian police, but the result is often unsuccessful.
In order to take a closer step, Jim chose to join forces with others this time.
His first co-author was Mark Rober, a former NASA engineer who worked on the Mars rover. After leaving his job, Mark became a tech blogger, working on small inventions all day long.
He is also obsessed with justice, such as in order to teach the thief of the courier, Mark once made a device box called a flash bomb, which will release special odors and gold powder when opened.
After Mark joined the team, they found Trilogy Media, which also made anti-scam videos: a combination of two bloggers who were good at using various spoofs to fight fraud.
The three sides immediately agreed, and decided to work together to find a way to deal with these scammers who wanted to be in India. So we began to carry out a careful layout:
"Mad Scientist" Mark is responsible for making the trick props; "Hacker Batman" Jim uses special means to hack into the surveillance of scam agencies and get more information; and the two bloggers of "Justice Twins" Trilogy Media go directly to India to perform operations.
At this point, the Justice Squad assembled for the first time. On the road to anti-fraud, they will no longer be alone.
The plan began.
Using information contributed by hacker Jim, the justice squad participants set their sights on four large telecom fraud studios in Kolkata, India. These studios have either been operating for more than a decade or have thousands of employees, which is a deep sin. The crowd decided to start a disciplinary program against these studios.
The most important step is to infiltrate. To complete their revenge plan, several bloggers hired ten private investigators to infiltrate the four scam studios in batches and let them gain the trust of their superiors.
This means that undercover agents have to actively participate in fraud work. Although this requires a lot of psychological shadows and guilt, the undercover agents still actively cooperate with these heavenly condemnation work. But in order to minimize the impact, they also wrote down the victims' information and doubled the compensation out of their own pockets.
And such a low salary, the information obtained is of course worth it.
Based on the various front-line materials provided by the undercover agents, the Justice Squad quickly gained access to a wealth of useful information, including office area layouts, employee and boss habits, and even company culture.
They even had the privilege of witnessing the team-building activities of the fraud gangs,
At the same time, the undercover agents also figured out the secret of how these fraud gangs have been operating for a long time:
These hundreds of telecommunications fraud companies usually have their own official websites, and the companies also have a serious main business and its office. They arranged for a few employees to pretend to do formal work here to cope with the inspection.
Even if there are police officers to see, this is a serious company posture. But in fact, just across the wall is a crowded workplace for a large number of scammers. They work three shifts 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, in order to facilitate the "business" of all time zones around the world.
In these areas, almost everyone's mobile phones are monitored and cannot be connected to the Internet, and the undercover agents use micro devices to obtain some internal information.
The undercover agents can only secretly record some insider information
One of the undercover agents, because he forgot the advice of the Justice Squad, accidentally used his mobile phone to send undercover information, so he was exposed, and even found a residence by the fraud gang, and had to flee in a hurry.
Under a lot of pressure and surveillance, several undercover agents finally fully infiltrated the fraud gang and said they were successful, and the two bloggers of Trilogy Media also set off for India.
At this point, a year and a half has passed since the plan.
But just when they thought the plan was ready, the first turning point came.
Although one of the undercover agents had been found earlier, the remaining undercover agents were not detected because of their good precautions. But surprisingly, two bloggers from Trilogy Media, who had just traveled to India, were targeted by a fraud gang.
Justice twin Trilogy Media
Scammers secretly began offering bounties to the two bloggers. On Whatsapp, Indian scammers have a group of more than 55,000 people who are responsible for communicating with each other. Shortly after the two bloggers of Trilogy Media left for India, a warning message soon appeared within the group that they had discovered that the bloggers with intentions to fight fraud had arrived.
According to the content of the information, although these fraud gangs have not yet discovered the specific plans of these bloggers, they seem to have faintly smelled the smell of danger, decided to take strict precautions, and even issued a notice saying: "If you meet, kill without forgiveness."
The two bloggers of Trilogy Media, who had not yet realized that they had been exposed, were suddenly in an extremely dangerous situation. But fortunately, Mark, a scientist in the Justice Squad, had already taken precautions: he had secretly recruited a repentant former fraudster in advance.
The remorseful scammer is still in the group, and when he sees the message, he quickly sends a warning, which puts them at a completely passive disadvantage.
But death threats from scam gangs remain. However, it did not deter the two bloggers of Trilogy Media, who in this situation still chose to face the danger and stay in India. It is only that they promise to pay more attention to their actions and carry out their tasks in the most low-key situation possible.
It is precisely because of the viciousness displayed by these fraud gangs that the Justice Squad decided to go further and obtain the confidential information of the fraud gangs in order to eliminate them.
But they have their first overarching problem: While there have been a number of undercover infiltrators for a year, they are not yet well positioned to obtain the most critical and confidential data , which is kept on the computers of the bosses of the scam gangs.
Due to the limited conditions, the hacker Jim also failed to break the password of the boss's computer through technical means. But he came up with another way —
Before that, they had breached the surveillance system of the fraud gang, and the boss's office also happened to have a surveillance camera with the right angle.
By watching the video, they successfully saw the process of the boss entering the password and directly obtained the password.
Business data and a lot of critical information are in place, and the conditions for ending the dens are in place. They were ready to carry out the second step: a frontal invasion.
Daily active data of the scam team obtained through the boss's computer
They have prepared the equipment and plans to begin just sanctions.
But just when they were ready to break through, the previously complicated office suddenly became empty...
Things always go through twists and turns.
When the Trilogy Media crowd in India arrived in Kolkata to prepare to head to a monitored studio, their whereabouts were revealed again, and the scam agency felt threatened to approach and immediately went into hiding in various ways.
They moved all the staff in the office to an isolated place, and the undercover agents were naturally included, perhaps because the fraud gang had taken a closer step of control, and the undercover agents suddenly disappeared.
Although the insider data and information have been obtained, the "frontal breakout" they prepared cannot be smoothly staged, and all the undercover agents are missing. Just as the Justice Squad was in a confused situation, another piece of good news came in time:
Remorseful former telecom fraudsters, with their extensive past experience, successfully joined a studio and quickly gained trust and broke into the house, saying they wanted to support their work unconditionally.
In this regard, the studio became their main target of punishment. They immediately decided to let the latest undercover agent assist in the battle.
And the scientist Mark, began to sacrifice his own good play -
Mark prepares a multisensory attack, and the appetizer is a few small props: a water cup filled with an extremely pungent rotten scenter; a hand sanitizer with a dye; a box of Viagra with the boss's name written on it.
The undercover agents managed to set up these props properly — putting the stinky water cup on the desk, the hand sanitizer in the toilet, and the Viagra with the boss's name on it.
It didn't take long for the victim to appear, and surveillance footage showed that the studio crowd was quickly smoked to the point where the smell could not be found after the water bottle containing the decaying odor agent was opened.
As employees whose palms had turned blue walked out of the bathroom in confusion, many people in the office realized that something was wrong and fell into uneasiness.
However, it turns out that the spoof hand sanitizer is actually not effective, because the first few people did not wash their hands after going to the toilet
Still, most people are enthusiastically discussing why the boss would put his Viagra in a public bathroom.
It was, of course, just foreplay — they also let the undercovers into the office with a special trap box.
Inside the trap box, it was filled with locally produced mice and a hundred cockroaches.
These devices, known as "trap boxes", were equipped with timing devices, and the undercover agents quickly evacuated the scene after being arranged. While the employees were being distracted by Viagra, the trap was triggered and cockroaches began to move.
Several cockroaches could be seen on the ground through monitoring, a small number of which were observed and removed by humans, seemingly without causing more reactions.
Not long after, the smoke bombs that were loaded in the helmets of the motorcycle were also activated, and the scene was finally lively. Faced with the sudden fog in front of them, the employees quickly calmed down and took off the smoke bomb and threw it out.
Then the rats came. When the employees walked out with the box stuck with half a mouse, they saw cockroaches scurrying around the ground, and finally realized that things were not simple.
Scientist Mark's famous work, the modified version of the express delivery "bomb" that was once prepared for the courier thief, also appeared. However, due to the previous problems that made the people in the studio suspicious, the anonymous courier box sent to the studio was not opened in the office, but was carefully taken outside to be unwrapped.
Unsurprisingly, the courier bomb performed brightly, spraying water and spraying odor, which frightened the onlookers, and the built-in camera of the device also recorded the reaction of the scene and uploaded it to the cloud.
Bomb perspective
After a series of punishments, the next day the group of 50,000 people informed the fraudsters across India of their "attack", and almost all of them were alerted.
Therefore, for the sake of undercover safety, the crowd decided to abandon the same disciplinary plan for the other three fraud centers. Trilogy Media and their team also left India and returned to the United States, all for the time being.
But things were better than they expected: The scam agency, which had been successfully planned, went out of business for a few days. Although the means to punish them can only be said to be a prank, because they have been unknowingly penetrated too deeply, dozens of institutions across India have chosen to shut down for fear of exposure, and the other three companies that were originally targeted have been closed for several days. According to the data intelligence obtained by the previous hackers, this can reduce the scammer's income by at least 2 million US dollars.
Trilogy Media bloggers, who apparently resent the threats they faced in India, have released videos of the experience detailed and very unceremoniously provoked the scammers, claiming that they have obtained information about everyone in the Whatsapp group through some means and will provide them to the FBI at any time if necessary.
At this point, the Youtube blogger's transnational disciplinary plan against telecommunications fraud has come to an end.
Scientist Mark told everyone in the video of the recent good news: one of the four scam agencies they were targeting at the time had been completely eliminated by the police, and they also contributed key evidence. However, similar to the frustration that hacker Jim has encountered in the past, the other three and more scam agencies in India have not been affected and are still operating today.
This situation has left Indian natives feeling powerless— the undercover agent who had repented of his rehabilitation and made a great contribution to the disciplinary plan claimed that he had collected evidence of his boss's crimes during his work and handed it to the local police, who instead of bringing the villain to justice, betrayed him to his superiors.
It seems that the telecom fraud industry will not be so easy to hit, let alone easily uprooted, and the struggle between these bloggers and telecom fraud will certainly not go smoothly like the movie finale, harvesting the most happy ending.
But now, the three bloggers have restored the process and details of the revenge from their own perspectives, and produced a video to upload to the Internet, which has received nearly 40 million views.
In this regard, the participants of the Justice Squad have expressed their hope that they can attract more people's attention, on the one hand, they can make the fraud methods ineffective, on the other hand, they can also arouse the attention of the media to these exposed large fraud institutions and accelerate their demise.
In addition to reaping entertainment value as a video blogger, more viewers can learn about telecommunications fraud, recognize its harm, and try to avoid being deceived. Although limited in ability, the thrilling, exciting, and childlike planning and execution of these bloggers for nearly two years can be said to be worth it.