crime
Investigators bust large ring of call center fraudsters
Baden-Württemberg Interior Minister Thomas Strobl (r) and State Justice Minister Marion Gentges provide information about the strike against a network of telephone fraudsters. photo
© Nico Pointner/dpa
They are based abroad and work with the most perfidious methods: For years, telephone scammers have primarily been preying on older citizens. Now hundreds of investigators from all over Europe have turned the tables.
Hundreds of investigators from Germany and other countries have dismantled a huge network of telephone fraudsters. The Baden-Württemberg Interior Minister Thomas Strobl (CDU) spoke in Stuttgart of having the “probably the largest in Europe “Call center fraud uncovered”.
For this purpose, the officers in the Baden-Württemberg State Criminal Police Office have set up their own call center to eavesdrop on conversations, hunt down the fraudsters and warn their victims. Since December, more than 100 officers have been working in shifts and have secured 1.3 million telephone fraud conversations. In this way, the investigators prevented damage worth around ten million euros in around 6,000 cases.
In mid-April, in large-scale searches together with Europol and the Federal Criminal Police Office, 12 call centers were broken up in five countries, mainly in the Western Balkans, and 21 people were arrested. 16 of them are in custody abroad. Nine of the accused are call center operators. State Justice Minister Marion Gentges (CDU) also spoke of what was probably Europe’s greatest success in the fight against call center fraudsters.
Bank employees got the ball rolling
A prudent bank employee got the investigation rolling. Last year, a fraudster, pretending to be a police officer, called a 76-year-old woman from Freiburg to get her money, as Gentges reported. When the lady wanted to withdraw 120,000 euros from her checking account, the bank advisor informed the police. The fraudster’s Internet-based number turned out to be a gold mine for investigators, leading to a huge call center network.
The LKA Baden-Württemberg set up an investigation group that also included the police from Bavaria, Saxony and Berlin. Name: “Pandora”. Instead of turning off the identified number, they listened to tens of thousands of conversations in real time around the clock, were able to warn potential victims – and buy themselves time for the investigation.
80 percent of crimes could be prevented
According to the information, the perpetrators used the entire spectrum of telephone scams – they posed as close relatives, as bank employees, members of the consumer advice center, employees of a debt collection company or as police officers or public prosecutors. With threats of punishment, promises of prizes, debt collection demands or prepaid card fraud, they tried to con their victims throughout Germany out of their savings. The “Pandora” investigators were able to prevent more than 80 percent of the crimes.
In a concerted attack on April 18, apartments and business premises in several Western Balkan countries and Lebanon were simultaneously searched with the support of Europol and the Federal Criminal Police Office. The investigators seized data carriers, documents, cash and assets worth one million euros. The evidence is currently being evaluated.