Kumar, who lives in India, was a player in one of the world’s fastest-growing industries. The multi-billion scam business hit Canada hard last year, syphoning $379 million from victims, a 130 per cent boost compared to 2020.
The man, who didn’t want his full name used fearing for his safety, said he was a victim as well, misled into the industry by someone he owed money to. Kumar is now a white-collar worker after managing to quit the racket business.
Kumar said the scam process often begins with a leak of personal financial information by an employee — in a bank, a phone company, a department store — who are often well-educated but underemployed or paid poorly.
“Youngsters often look for ways to earn easy money, which leads them to illegal work,” Kumar said. “They earn in cash and hence evade taxes, too.
“These scammers are educated, unemployed people,” he said.
However, fraudsters aren’t limited to young educated adults, but anyone who has access to customers’ information can leak data, Kumar said.
He said the category and value of customers’ stolen data varies. Data involving people who have already been scammed is cheaper than the premium data of new targets.
He said premium data can be bought between a range of one to 10 Indian Paise per phone number. There are 100 Paise in a Rupee, worth about two cents Canadian.
“The data isn’t limited to phone numbers,” Kumar said. “In rare cases, scammers can get the social insurance numbers too, but most often they get general information such as the name, email and house address of the targeted victim.”
He said there were different approaches to contact potential victims. He said scammers send fake emails and calls pretending to be employees of different companies like Bell, Fido, Apple, Amazon and Microsoft, among others.
“Scammers often use big company names because people tend to trust them more easily considering them to be genuine,” Kumar said.
He said that other than emails and calls, scammers also use website pop-ups to hack victims’ devices or take remote control using software like Zoho Assist, AnyDesk and RemotePC.
Kumar said scammers prefer seniors, especially those who live by themselves and are over 50 years of age.
“These victims crave for connection as they live alone and scammers take advantage of this by building rapport and increasing closeness with them,” he said.
Kumar said a potential victim’s list is uploaded to software and an automated voice message associated with a brand is sent to all the phone numbers that are present in the data bought by the scammers. He said those who fall prey to the message and follow instructions are directed to the fake company representatives.
“Afterwards, it is all about convincing them to give remote access to their device and transfer money from their bank accounts,” Kumar said.
In order to scam victims, Kumar said in some cases scammers manipulate coding to show an increased account balance in the victims’ accounts to convince them that they are real.
The Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre’s (CAFC) data reports Canadians suffered historic financial losses of $379 million in 2021. CAFC stated that it is an increase of 130 per cent compared to 2020. And it doesn’t seem to be slowing down.
The CAFC reported 5,569 frauds in January from 3,634 victims, losing about $34 million.
March is Fraud Prevention Month in Canada, prompting cybersecurity officials to warn Canadians of increasing scams in the country.
“Raising awareness about fraud committed online is crucial to protect our communities,” said RCMP Supt. Denis Beaudoin, director of financial crime, in a news release.
The North York Community House recommends gathering all information about the fraud, including the date, time and any details about the fraudster, to report scams. Additionally, it suggested calling the respective banks and police, followed by contacting credit bureaus and the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre.
Jyothi Venkatesh, a staff member with Financial Literacy North York Community House, said the best way to stay protected from scams is to be vigilant to details.
Venkatesh said to always double-check the link one is accessing through an email, highlighting that http in a website address is always a red flag.
“Make sure that the web address has https in it, where ‘s’ stands to be secure,” she said.