The US authorities have uncovered a $5 million scam and shut down a California-based firm that cheated thousands of American customers with the help of Indian call centres that made millions of fraudulent and threatening "debt collector" calls.

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has shut down the operations of "American Credit Crunchers" and its affiliate "Ebreeze", prosecuting them and their owner, Varang K Thaker, for the operation swindle.

Operators from Indian call centres, often pretending to be US law enforcement officers and other Government officials, would falsely threaten to immediately arrest to arrest consumers if they did not agree to make a payment on a supposedly delinquent payday loan.

Curiously enough, perpetrators of the scam managed to collect moneys from people who did not owe any debts in the first place. "Claiming to be law enforcement, such as a local police department, the "Federal Department of Crime and Prevention," or simply a "federal investigator," the callers typically demanded more than $300, and sometimes as much as $2,000," the FTC said in papers submitted to a US District Court.