Recently there was a news report of a woman losing a little fortune for a pencil marketing scam in India. In the contemporary world, digital marketing has become a lucrative job for all. This promises a good income from the home comfort zone and just needs two tools: internet connection and a digital technology enabled device (it can be either a smart phone or a laptop or desktop computer). But this is a myth bursting report for everyone who may read this article. I have been contacted by a recruiter agency recently and I got to see a practical example as how such agencies dupe people, especially women.

1. How do these agencies get the phone numbers of the target victims?

Apparently they have a super research team who may go for data mining from every possible source: this can be data base of the shops where we may have recently visited and shared the phone numbers, our phone data recharging agencies where our phone numbers are supposedly saved for processing the data, third party service providers who may be working with our phone numbers, Aadhar data etc., for our professional workspaces etc. The one who contacted me (un)smartly shared that they collect ‘verified numbers’ by partnering with telecom companies for the purpose of market survey for their clients. Now the question is: who are these telecom companies? Apparently they are the digital communication service providers like Airtel, Jio, Vodafone etc. But not really: there are many telecom agencies who are middlemen. They are the agents of the main data fiduciary. They are data collectors, recharge service providers and they are all bound in the same legal chain, namely Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 and Information Technology Act, 2000(amended in 2008).

• Modus operandi: These ‘agency’ people filter the profile of data profiles on the basis of certain criteria. This may include age, gender and geo-location. They may contact the target through SMS or through WhatsApp. In the case of later, they may start the conversation by stating about the daily estimated income and after that they may share the trial task. It is but obvious that they do not stick to a static number. Hence if one completes the trial task and shares the bank details, the scammer may ‘vanish’ with account details and some essential confidential information that may enable them to access the account without much hard work.
• Now comes the question as what type of task would be given and what is the ‘job’. This surprised me because I am a foodie and I really trust the ‘stars’. But its time to come out of the myth. No restaurant may have a neat 5 star from customers and diners. It’s the manipulative work of digital marketing companies that may outsource the job to people like me and you and in between some scammers may join to mint money from both the parties. I was asked to rate restaurants from Google map and the ‘task’ restaurant was somewhere 260 kilometers away from where I stay. I have never visited the restaurant and the place where it is situated. I have never seen their menu card nor I have tasted their food (nope, not even by Zomato  or Swiggy because they wont deliver any food item so far).

Now probably you may know how some restaurants, shops, hotels or even health care service providers may get 5 stars and stay at the top of search list!

But that’s not all. These agencies may necessarily provide links to upload positive comments and stars. A click on them may invite many more digital trouble.

• Would they be worried if you tell them you have lifted the ‘innocent veil’ and found out who they are? Answer is ‘no’. That’s because they would take seconds to change their phone numbers and delete all texts shared with the victims to disable the latter to take any evidence to the police.

Why are they targeting women? A possible answer is women, especially undergraduate students and home makers may need to make money from the comfort of home. It’s a moonlighting while the home makers are involved in full time household chores.  And yes, most the targets may not be able to suspect the scammers because they may use women’s photographs in their WhatsApp profiles. As such, we may never know who accesses our WhatsApp or Instagram profile pictures and how they may be misused.

The laws that may help: First of all, understand why they are called scammers and what sort of crime they are doing. Digital personal data protection Act , 2023 has mandated that all data collectors must mandatorily explain the reason behind colleting the personal data (including the phone numbers) of data principals. All data fiduciaries are also mandated to explain why and how the collected data will be processed. Have you ever heard from your shopping mall or any other service provider stating you clearly why they are collecting your number? It’s not n for future connection. But its for sharing our phone numbers (whether consciously or unconsciously) with scammers who may continue to feed other business establishments   by providing unauthorized information. S.43A of the Information Technology Act, 2000(amended in 2008) makes the body corporate liable to pay damages to data owners for negligence to protect the integrity of the data. But this is the live example as how all stakeholders in this regard dupe the actual data principle.

Often victims who may understand that they are trapped, may try to counter these scammers by calling them, sharing photos and numbers of the scammers on the social media portals, or even try to reach out to them searching for the physical office addresses. Each of these may invite different kinds of trouble. The best way to address this is to be aware of the patterns of  fraudulent activities done by such scammers, block and report the phone  numbers to the intermediary and report the matter to the portal of https://cybervolunteer.mha.gov.in/webform/Volunteer_AuthoLogin.aspx  . Remember, we women are the chosen target for cyber crooks because they feel women are less empowered. It is our right to be safe and duty to prove them wrong!

Stay safe.

Please don’t infringe the copyright of this write-up. Please cite this as Halder.D(2023). Looking for 5 star restaurants or amenities or service providers? Here is the reality. Published on 11-11-2023 @https://wordpress.com/post/internetlegalstudies.com/1472