From the safety of their home in India, Karan and Arjun Mishra pull off cruel scam after scam. They prey on the vulnerable 5,000 miles away in Britain, persuading them to part with tens of thousands of pounds.
The brothers stole £180,000 from an 83-year-old widow in Somerset by tricking her into believing she was helping them catch criminals. It cost her her life savings.
Another victim, recently retired, is still too ashamed to tell her husband that she was conned out of £10,000. It was a hefty slice of their nest egg.At least nine more are thought to have been targeted by the shameless pair.They include Thomas Mulligan, 85, a retired NHS surgeon and devout Christian who is always keen to help others.
When he received a landline phone call from an Amazon cyber security representative who said he needed his help to stop evil hackers, he did everything they asked.
Little did he know that he was on the phone to the very criminals he was helping 'catch' – and they were about to drain his bank account. The widower was lulled into a false sense of security because the scammers already knew his bank details. It is likely they bought them online from hackers.Karan told him that criminals had used his account and he was being chased for outstanding debt. He asked Mr Mulligan to make a payment of £10,000 into a specific bank account. Then they would be able to follow the money, catch the criminals and refund him in full.
After Mr Mulligan downloaded software under Karan's guidance, the scammers had complete control over his computer – including all his documents. Details of Mr Mulligan's passport and ID were all hoovered up.
Now the Mishras would try to empty Mr Mulligan's retirement pot. They set up a Binance account – a platform to trade cryptocurrency – in his name. This has a stringent verification process: email codes, documents and verification texts are all required.
But the fraudsters jumped through every hoop with ease. They even made Mr Mulligan look into the computer camera and blink three times – helping them pass another hurdle in the race for his cash. Then – just as the brothers went about their business of helping themselves to the pensioner's retirement pot – Mr Mulligan's mobile phone began to ring.
And into our story stepped our hero: a crusader against the online scammers, who goes by the pseudonym Jim Browning.
'Please don't announce this but I think you're on the phone with people who are trying to steal your money', Mr Browning said. Mr Mulligan hung up on the criminals, telling Mr Browning he believed he had been talking to 'cyber security' experts. Incensed, the Mishra brothers, still on Mr Mulligan's computer, began typing, telling him: 'You hang up the mobile call straight away.'
But it was too late. Thanks to Mr Browning's dramatic intervention the spell they had worked over the retired surgeon was broken.
Every moment was filmed by Mr Browning, who has turned the tables on the fraudsters and hacked into their computers.
The police were able to track the money and save £5,000. Santander would not refund the outstanding £5,000, though it said it was reviewing that decision.
So just who is Jim Browning – and how did he get involved?
He's an ethical hacker from Northern Ireland who fought back after he was targeted by bogus callers seven years ago.
An IT worker putting his knowledge to crime-busting use, he has infiltrated the computers of hundreds of scammers – sometimes hacking into three systems a day.
He reckons his one-man crusade has saved victims around £4million by derailing frauds and shutting down calls centres – at least five in India. The largest transaction he has managed to intercept during a live scam was £30,000.