Americans lost more than $10 billion in online scams in 2022, the vast majority of which were defrauded by Indian scam companies, according to an FBI report.

It is understood that because many American companies, including Microsoft, have put their customer service centers in India in recent years, the "call center" business in India has developed rapidly. This has also given criminals the opportunity to use this model to operate a large number of fake call centers and commit fraud.

U.S. citizens lost a total of $10.2 billion to such scams this year, up 47 percent from $6.9 billion in 2021. Online fraud gangs in India have been targeting Americans, especially those over 60. According to data from the past two years, Indian scam syndicates have caused more than $3 billion in losses to elderly Americans in the name of "emotional problems" and "tech support" (i.e., pop-up Windows on electronic devices promising to provide technical support).

Earlier, police in the Indian capital New Delhi raided and arrested three suspects specializing in such illegal activities, according to reports. They promised elderly Americans "technical support" and then committed fraud. According to the information provided by the US, between 2012 and 2022, more than 20,000 victims were deceived in this way (under the guise of "technical support").

According to the FBI's website for reporting cybercrime, there were 850,000 complaints about such cases in 2021, with an estimated loss of $6.9 billion. There were 780,000 complaints about such cases in the first 11 months of 2022, with an estimated loss of $10.2 billion. Suhel Daud, director of the FBI's South Asia division, said the number of scams under the guise of "technical support" increased by 137 percent in 2021 and 128 percent in 2022. The biggest losses were in the investment sector, at $3 billion, Mr. Dawood said. The amount of fraud committed through emotion was $1 billion; The amount of fraud carried out through "technical support" was $781 million.

In light of the increase in fraud cases from India, the FBI has also assigned a permanent representative to the U.S. Embassy in India, hoping to work with Interpol and the Indian police to curb such crimes.