1.8 Million Fraudulent Calls Resulted in the Shutdown of the Scam Platform by UK Authorities.

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The scam platform behind 1.8 million fraudulent calls, Russian Coms, has been shut down by the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA).

Russian Coms was laid out in 2021 and is believed to be behind financial losses in the tens of millions of pounds, according to an NCA statement published on August 1.

The NCA said that over the course of three years, over 1.3 million calls were made by Russian Coms users to 500,000 unique UK phone numbers.

The average loss was £9,400 ($12,000) based on those who reported to Action Fraud.

Calls were made to individuals in 107 different countries around the world, including the USA, New Zealand, Norway, France and the Bahamas.

The Platform That Powered Millions of Scams

The platform allowed criminals to hide their identity by appearing to call from pre-selected numbers, most commonly of financial institutions, telecommunications companies and law enforcement agencies.

This enabled them to gain the trust of victims before stealing their money and personal details, the NCA explained.

Russian Coms was made available as a handset and, latterly, as a web app, marketed through Snapchat, Instagram, and Telegram.

According to adverts shared across social media, the service included “unlimited minutes”, “hold music”, “encrypted phone calls”, “instant handset wipe”, international calls, voice changing services, and 24/7 support.

The NCA said a typical scam would involve offenders spoofing the number of a bank to gain the trust of a victim, before convincing them that their account had been subject to fraudulent activity. They would then be persuaded to transfer their money to another account to safeguard their savings.

The handset version of Russia Coms could only be used to make spoofed calls. The NCA said it would be loaded with several fake applications that had no functionality, to make it look like an everyday smartphone if seized by law enforcement.

This was notwithstanding a few VPN applications, permitting the client to conceal their IP address and a burn app that instantly wiped the phone after being activated. A six-month contract cost between £1,200 ($1500) and £1,400 ($1800), depending on collection and delivery.

“Whilst this use of technology, which can be called ‘crime as a service’, promises anonymity, unbeknown to the criminal users, the services also store the users’ data, so we can identify who they are and how they operate,” Adrian Searle, Director of the National Economic Crime Centre within the NCA, said.

“Clients of Russian Coms, and every one of those tempted to try out similar services, should know that these services cannot be trusted.”

Roughly 40% of all wrongdoing against people in Britain and Ribs is represented by extortion, and it is accepted that more than 80% of it is empowered by innovation.

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