Police have busted a fake call centre operating in Maharashtra's Palghar district and allegedly cheating people in Canada and threatening them to make payments for online purchase orders, officials said on Sunday.

Twenty three people have so far been arrested in this connection, they said.

Acting on a tip-off, the police raided the call centre, operating from six flats at a housing complex in Nane village of Wada taluka to evade coming under the scanner of security agencies, on the intervening night of Friday-Saturday, Superintendent of Police (Rural) Balasaheb Patil said.

The accused made use of different applications like X-Lite, Eyebeam and X-ten and illegally obtained the contact details of various citizens of Canada, he said.

They would call up people about online purchase orders, which were not actually made by the victims, and direct them to a number of the fake call centre.

Those working at the call centre were given a specific script to communicate with the victims. If the victims avoided them, the accused threatened them saying criminal and legal action will be taken against them, and forced them to make payments through different means including Bitcoin, the official said.

The accused made "voice calls and robotic calls" to avoid being identified, he said.

They cheated a number of people from Canada, the police said, adding they suspect the accused made calls to people in other countries also.

Following the raid, the police arrested 23 people from the call centre. At least four more persons were involved in the racket going on for long and efforts were on to trace them, the official said.

A case was registered against the accused under relevant provisions of the Indian Penal Code, the Information Technology Act and the Indian Telegraph Act, Wada police station's senior inspector Suresh Kadam said.

A probe was on into the case, the police said.

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