Two secret call centers uncovered in Tashkent, hundreds of young men and women detained (video)

A cybercrime group consisting of hundreds of young men and women and led by a foreign citizen has been detained in Tashkent city. The Ministry of Internal Affairs reported this.

According to preliminary information, members of the network had been deceiving citizens of foreign countries with promises of high-yield investment and cryptocurrency projects and misappropriating their funds. For this purpose, young people with excellent foreign language skills, including students of prestigious universities, were recruited, with each of them making hundreds of calls a day.

During operational measures, two major call centers were uncovered in Tashkent city. During search and investigative actions conducted on the sixth floor of a business center in Yashnabad district, a total of 97 people were identified at a call center located in the building. Five of them were foreign citizens.

Operational measures also continued in Yakkasaray district. Another call center was discovered on the 11th floor of a business center, where 34 people were found to be operating, three of whom were foreign citizens.

At the call centers, managers, organizers, assistants, team leaders and operators prepared phishing links containing content designed to attract victims with promises of earning up to 70% income per month. They then called citizens of Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, Norway, the Netherlands, Denmark and other foreign countries using fake numbers and, under the guise of trading, induced them to transfer crypto-assets as investments.

It was reported that employees were specially trained to follow strict rules of secrecy when being recruited, and they communicated with foreign citizens under aliases. Access to the buildings was strictly controlled, with special guards permanently stationed at the entrances.

During the operational measures, law enforcement officers identified and documented 136 computers, 90 monitors, 73 processors and 53 all-in-one computers, 320 telephones, 128 hard drives and 175 memory devices, two safes and other equipment used by the organized group to carry out criminal activities at the above-mentioned addresses.

A criminal case has been opened by the Investigation Department of the Cybercrime Combat Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and preliminary investigative actions are underway.

It was revealed that the person who organized the scheme is a foreign citizen who carried out illegal activities in Uzbekistan in cooperation with a citizen of the Republic of Uzbekistan born in 1978. These two leaders of the criminal association and eight other people considered key suspects in the illegal activities of the call centers have been placed in custody.

In addition, 10 more suspects have been detained, while operational inquiries and investigative actions are being carried out with the remaining 111 people.

Earlier, it was reported that a foreign student involved in illegal crypto-asset exchange had been detained in Jizzakh region. A total of 1,250,319,973 soums worth of crypto-assets had been exchanged through his crypto wallet.