I normally don’t pickup promotional calls from +91114... numbers, but yesterday (3rd Feb 2018), I was expecting a service call from my Broadband Service Provider Airtel, so picked up a call from +911141216900 and it turned out to be a promotional call. I wanted to cut the phone, but they started telling me information about my last purchase from PayTM, and I continued with the call. They had my full name, phone number, last purchase details (according to them) including the item & price from PayTM, and my complete shipping address including pin code. Unfortunately for them, it was not my latest purchase from PayTM, as I had ordered few items after that as well. But I continued with the call to understand where they are going with this.
They explained to me a reward point system which has won me some electronic gadget and I just need to claim it. I have to visit a website called www.shoppingcraving.com and fill up a contest form. This form will also require me to pay 1499 as registration fee, but after paying the registration fee, I will get some goodies free of cost. This goodie bag is excluding the prize I won, and just a reward for registration. I told them that I will visit the site and check out the form. The call ended with them asking me to call back and confirm once I have done the registration.
I was sure it was a fraud, as PayTM will not give you any reward points, but their business model is of direct cashback. But I still went to the website to see how they have created this fraudulent front of their business. I was surprise to see that the site is crying out loud to the visitor that I am a false site. They have done a very bad job but if they are still getting people fall for their trick, I think people of our country are very much gullible. I am giving some examples which shows that the site is fake, and people are getting you to give them money, but you will not get anything in return. The site owner might read this as well, and fix these issues with their site, to make it look like more credible for their new victims. But for all the people out there, my message is loud and clear to safeguard yourself from any such fraud.
NO PROMOTIONAL ACTIVITY OR PRIZE WILL REQUIRE YOU TO PAY ANY MONEY. IF YOU ARE ASKED TO PAY, IT IS A FRAUD.
NEVER GIVE AWAY ANY OF YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION, INCLUDING NAME, ADDRESS, EMAIL, PHONE, BANK ACCOUNT NUMBER, ATM/DEBIT CARD NUMBER, ANY OTP MESSGES RECEIVED ON YOUR PHONE OR ANY INFORMATION ASKED FROM YOU ABOUT YOU. IF THEY ARE ASKING YOU FOR YOUR INFORMATION, THEY DON’T KNOW ABOUT YOU AND THEY DON’T HAVE ANY PRIZE FOR YOU.
If you keep the above two in mind, you will never get caught by these phone calls. I once got a call from my bank, as my Bank Statement was returned from my postal address, and they wanted me to re-confirm my address. I refused to give them this information, and later called my Bank’s customer care to provide the address. This is the right way to deal with any such phone call. Even if it is genuine, if they are asking you for information, don’t trust them. When you call them on published customer care number, banks are required to keep an audio recording of that call. This can save you from any such fraudulent calls.
Anyway, coming back to main topic of this article, I obviously didn’t fill up the form or paid any money. So I got another call from same number, asking if I have registered. I simply said that I didn’t like the details and decided not to participate. The call ended after this exchange. But, they called me again, within 5 minute of the earlier call. This time, it was a different person, asking me why I didn’t participate. I simply told him that I didn’t like the scheme, and not participating it. But he first tried to convince me that it was a sure thing, and I should take it, and soon turned abusive. So, I told him that by being abusive, he confirmed that it is a fraud, and simply cut the phone. They didn’t call me back so far, and it was end of story. They may have moved on to their next prey.
Now, let’s check their website, which should be enough to tell everyone that it is a fraudulent site. Below are the details of site, including screenshots.
This is their home page, looks nicely designed. But wait, why is the “contest” link starts with small letter, unlink all other items? And which shopping site will have direct Checkout link even before you have not added anything to your cart? Let’s scroll down to see what else they have done.
Ok, they have product category showing they sell Electronics, Home & Kitchen, Men and Women items. But wait, why do they have only 1 Product in Combo Offers and Electronics? And why the Home & Kitchen has 0 product? Men have at least 2 products.
And Women fashion (I am assuming its fashion from the pic) has the highest, 4 products in their catalogue. So, this is a shopping site with total 8 product to offer. How can you trust site like this for anything?
They have listing of their latest product as well, with very high prices, but they are not here to sell anything, right? So, this is ok. Let’s scroll further.
Further down on the home page, they have this Products section, which I think they forgot to remove. It shows 4 categories, with zero product in each of these.
Then at the bottom of this page, they have contact details and links to other sections of website. I tried clicking on the links to all Social Network icons like FaceBook, Twitter etc, but all were redirected to this site only. So, they don’t have any social netwok presence, but wants to show that they are professional. The number they have given as contact, is the same number I got calls from. I am not sure if the address is correct though.
This is where it turn hilarious, as their “About” page is left unedited, and shows the example text from template they have used. I don’t think I need to tell you what it says, just read it. Also, check out the Blog like section in right side, read that too. It’s funny.
And the final nail in coffin, is the Customer Service page, which is blank, showing you that there is no customer service.
Remember the right panel blog like interface with example like texts? I found few more links, which is supposed to be the Archive section of this website. Clicking on December 2017 archives, brings out this page. Enjoy reading it.
I went on to check the details about this domain, and found the details of person who has registered this domain. Below are the details of all in one person, who is also owner, admin and tech contact for this site, and I am assuming the master mind behind this scam as well.
Registrant Name: pankaj singh
Registrant Organization:
Registrant Street: rithala vill. khasara no. 77/03
Registrant Street: building rithala 110089
Registrant City: Delhi
Registrant State/Province: Delhi
Registrant Postal Code: 110089
Registrant Country: IN
Registrant Phone: +91.9933609065
Registrant Phone Ext:
Registrant Fax:
Registrant Fax Ext:
Registrant Email: info@amaz-delas.com (this is a fake email id, as there is no such domain)
So, to sum up the above, Mr. Pankaj Singh has registered a domain, created a fake shopping site using some WordPress template, and done a very bad job in site designing, then proceeded to link a PayPal account for payment, and started this racket of cheating people. There might be others involved in this, but his name is clearly written all over it. Now, it took me total 5 minutes to lookup all this on internet. But I also saw some post of people complaining that they have given money to these guys, and got nothing in return. Some people have posted that they have given money multiple times. I am not an online security expert, and don’t have any back door access. But if these people go and log Police complain about such rackets, they may not get their money back, but police can catch these cheaters and stop anyone else to be victimised. When I can get all this info within 5 minutes and with public access, think about how much our Police’s cyber wing can get! Most of the online fraud continues not because of anonymity, but because of lack in action from the victim and police side. People don’t want to waste time on following up or logging complain about some small amount. Sometime they feel shame of getting caught into such trap, and keep quiet about it to avoid further embarrassment. I once order few books from a site and paid Rs 500 as online payment. I never receive the books or got my money back. I posted on their facebook page, but I think the site was already closed and they didn’t care much for bad publicity. That was not a fraud, but may have been a case of starup getting shut down. I did have all their details like the above, but I didn’t follow up with police complaint or the payment company, and accepted the loss of Rs 500 due to my laziness. This is what most people do in case of actual fraud as well.
Anyway, now let’s talk about the personal info they had on me, and try to find out the source for that info. So, they had my name, number, complete address and last order details on PayTM site. There are only three ways to get this information:
1) They got hold of PayTM data by some hacking. But I don’t think this was the case, as they didn’t have my email address and were asking about it. So, PayTM is ruled out for data theft.
2) The seller “TIRUPATI BIZ LINK LLP” have all this information given by PayTM for shipping the order, and they will not have the email id.
3) The courier company “Xpressbees”, another start up operating from Mumbai will also have all these details with them, and they will also not have the email id.
So, out of three, it is possible that the data is collected from seller or courier database. I don’t know if seller or Courier Company is involved in this fraud, but this is something I cannot be certain about with my research online. But my best bet is on data stolen from their weak system and sold in market for a price. Also, a courier tracking system will have more sophisticated and organised data of their shipments, including the details mentioned above. If I have to pick a source, I will pick up currier database for gathering information to do such fraudulent act. It is clear that our personal information is out there in the market. So, we need to be more careful while acting on such fraudulent calls. We should not be intimidated by the fact they know so many personal things about us. We need to accept the fact that our online presence is a public info, and we should not let anyone manipulate us with this information.
Anyway, like most of others, I normally ignore such calls and move on with my life like nothing happened. It’s just that I had some spare time this Sunday morning, I decided to write this and post it. I am not sure if this will help normal people from being victim of similar frauds or it will help the fraudster fix the issues with their website, making it look more reliable. I hope it helps the right people.
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