London, England.- A criminal network that defrauded hundreds of thousands of victims across several continents of millions of dollars through fraudulent phone calls has been exposed in an international police operation, Scotland Yard and Europol announced Thursday.

Total losses worldwide exceed 100 million pounds (119 million dollars, 115 million euros) and 142 suspects have been arrested, the European Union’s police cooperation agency reported.

Directed by the authorities of Great Britain, the international operation relies on the cooperation of the American FBI and police from several European Union countries, Australia, Canada and Ukraine, which is called Europol.

It is the largest anti-fraud operation ever undertaken by British police, according to Scotland Yard.

In England alone, more than 100 people have been arrested, mainly for fraud. Among them is Teejai Fletcher, 34, who is suspected of hosting the iSpoof platform, which facilitates large-scale fraud.

The number of potential victims rose to over 200,000, costing tens of millions of pounds in England alone. The average amount of money swindled one at a time was 10,000 pounds.

The iSpoof website sells computer tools to criminals that allow them to impersonate representatives of large banks or institutions by displaying the trusted phone numbers of banks, tax offices, or government agencies to obtain money or access codes to bank accounts by telephone or SMS.

Fraudsters using the platform pay in bitcoins, between £150 and £5,000 depending on the service purchased.

As of August this year, 10 million calls were made worldwide, 40% of which were to the United States and over 30% to the United Kingdom.

“The use of technology by organized criminals is one of the greatest challenges of the 21st century,” said London Police Chief Mark Rowley.

The authorities are continuing to investigate to find more users of the fraudulent network.

These arrests “send a message to cybercriminals that they can no longer hide behind international anonymity,” said Catherine de Bolle, director general of Europol. AFP