A syndicate was gaining profit from illegal charges for services provided to clients of different telecom companies who weren’t aware of making payment.

7 employees, a company director and technical staff members, got under investigation – staffers from a number of telecoms disclosed customer personal data as they were allegedly bribed by the syndicate which needed customer data to use for malicious purposes. The criminal group has been neutralised by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) but has already collected millions of ringgit as a result of the 5-year fraudulent collaboration.

Each affected customer was being charged from 50 sen to 4 ringgit (10 cents to $1) all the time the scam was on.

The syndicate would use the stolen customer personal data and send SMS providing promotional and other services to telecoms’ clients. The violators’ aim was to take money from prepaid card users because this way their bills wouldn’t show those unlawful charges. The criminal group is said to have been making claims to telcos as service charges, thus shovelling money from the companies as well.