Revenge on the Indian Call Centers

Available on the huge retailer website.  Latest third version is about $80.

Happily, not something I need but thanks for the info.

Exactly, couldn't have said it better myself.  For curiosity, I do like to check my CID at the end of each day to see how many have called, though, since my answering machine doesn't record 'hangups.'

Welcome to the light of reason, Let not the dark force of scammer trouble you no more for you yourself now know how to defeat them. As Alfred P. Newman once said " What, Me Worry" from the MAD many years ago. Waiting on youngest grand daughter to show me the latest copy with all of the laughter and smirks to boot!!!

That's Alfred E. Neuman to you, ya furshlugginer fold-in.

Seriously?   The BRITISH came to India and did their thing.   The USA never did.   In fact, the US largely supported Gandhi.

So why are you scamming the USA?   I don't hear of all these scam call complaints from the UK!

Just admit the scammer scum targets the country with the money.

Sadly, yes, our Congress has made usury legal and the states mostly allow pay day loans to carry ridiculous interest.

Same thing as those still extant sex call numbers use.   They get you to call back and stay on the line as long as possible, because they charge by the minute.

Same deal with the "say yes" guys.   They usually pretend to be pollsters, but answering "yes" to anything is their goal, because they'll record the yes, then play it back to the phone center as "Do you authorize a charge of 20 dollars to your phone line for this service?   "yes"."

The "say yes" scam is an overblown, unsubstantiated rumor with no documented proof of anyone actually being harmed by simply saying the word "yes". Think about it - why would they need a recording of you saying it when they could simply record anyone and claim it was you?

The media has been promoting the scary conclusion that a recorded "Yes" will obligate you to a purchase, a debt or a change in some service provider.  So far, the facts do not support that conclusion.

Here is what I have discovered from getting calls.  The Yes/No questions are used by some humans and even more interactive bots to qualify the person as being a likely mark for a scam. The robots and the technology are getting better and better.  Each "Yes" gets you further in the hierarchy of questions to establish if you are a candidate for talking to a real human who will try to close the deal and get your money.

- The very first question, "Hi, how are you today?"  is to establish you are a real person, not an answering machine and willing to respond to questions.   A "No" will probably get you disconnected.
- If you answer "Yes" you will get very general pitch about the scam.  You may be asked something like "How does that sound?".  One test to see if you are being called by a bot is to say "Repeat that".  You will hear the same pitch, word for work, in the same exact tone of voice.  Or you might be disconnected.
- Eventually, you will get questions relating to how strong your interest is in the scam and payment: "You are ready for that cruise, aren't you?" and then "You do have a major credit card, don't you?"  A "Yes" will get you to a live person, a "No" gets you turfed.
- The bot will transfer the call, and usually "say" something to the human sales rep picks up the call, something like "Joe, I have someone here who is really interested in having their pancreas removed by vultures on that exciting 2 day cruise to the leper colony."  Joe will then take the call and try to close the sale.

Big Ticket Scammers use these bots.  There are companies that specialize in making the calls, and if the mark qualifies, forwarding the call to the actual scammer.  The bots try to maintain the illusion that they are Human, to get you trained to respond to Yes/No questions.

Some places call this "Yes-set Close" (http://changingminds.org/disciplines/sales/closing/yes-set_close.htm). You're training your mark to get into the habit of saying "Yes" with easy questions, so when you try to close the sale, it's easier for you to say "Yes".

Some of the "bots" are really foreigners with sound boards, but I've had some hang up on me if I don't respond with an actual "Yes" to a question like "Are you over 18?" or "Do you have a major credit card?". Some accept "I do" / "of course" type responses and go on.

To add to B-Edwards, I think these telemarketing companies are mostly foreign and intentionally screening TCPA/DNC complaints from their clients - and being overseas, they are generally immune. The US-based clients may not know that the calls being transferred to them are violating the DNC and they are potentially liable. That's why I try to get past the robocall / foreign "qualifying" agent as fast as possible to find out who's really behind the call.

Thanks for that link - I have been probing the strategies these callers are using - the logic employed that either gets me further along or disconnected.  And I am looking for weaknesses. Twice I have found words/language that gets the bots in a loop repeating the same phrase over and over and over. I kept one bot going for 20 minutes, and for all I know I could have keep it going forever.  I don't want to give details here since scammers do check these threads, so no hints.

There is a mix of both Old and New in these calls.  The idea of getting a mark into a "yes answer" mindset is a truism that was old when I learned to do cold-calls 40 years ago. That and the assumed sale gimmick: "How about the 2 day 2 night cruise, or would the 2 night, 2 day cruise be better?"  is another example. I don't think those tricks work as well as they once did, we are all a bit smarter now.

Bots are the future and no doubt about it.  More and more I am getting two-stage calls run by bots, and my sense of it is that the first caller is contracted to make the qualifying calls for many types of scams. Lets the actual scammer get right down to business. Cheaper and probably more effective than making the calls in-house.  Seems like only the smaller debt scammers and the badger games are run in house.  And the random "Hi Grandma, I need bail money" callers.

My personal favorite tactic is just to play extremely dumb, ask the same questions over and over, provide false info for every step of their so called process, and waste their time to the point they get frustrated and end the call. This has the added advantage of being seemingly legitimate. So they're more likely to remove your number simply because they won't want to deal with the process long enough. It costs them more than they'd potentially make and they won't make any money selling your number to another scam center since it's a worthless number now.

Ha, sort of a false dichotomy "do you want 1 or 2", and ignoring the proper choice of "neither".

Many places probably do use out-sourced telemarketing services. Some run the campaign/robocalls and charge the client anywhere from $2 to $35 per "qualified lead". Other places (like the IRS scams, Mexican vacation, and others) seem to be all in-house. I had some where 1 phone number, same robocall pitch ended up being transferred to two different companies. So those are obviously out-sourced.

My only thing are that more of the bots (whether plain dumb prerecords, people behind soundboards, or more sophisticated voice response systems) aren't the real target. That are just pre-qualification tools to insure that the called person is "interested" and not going to waste the human agents time and/or reduce the liability for the company contracting the campaign. However, there are likely many multiple autodialers per human agent, so I'm not sure that's as effective a target, or provides as much ammo to the FTC. But every bit helps and is useful and could expose a vulnerability. I admit it would be funny to listen to a robocall get trapped in a loop!

My strategy is generally to make the bots happy quickly to get to the heart of the matter. I want to get to the actual client and find out about them. I'm generally less interested in the telemarketing service, since it seems many of them are off-shore and generally untouchable by the FTC. Some of the IRS/grant scam ones, especially with call-back numbers, are susceptible to being DDoS'ed, so I'm down with people doing that.