Three Sentenced For International Multi-Million Dollar Tech Support Fraud Scheme

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Three men were sentenced to prison today for conspiracy to commit wire fraud for their involvement in an international multi-million dollar technical support fraud scheme, announced the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of North Carolina.

Reid Davis, Acting Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Charlotte Field Office, and Joseph E. Carrico, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI, Nashville Field Office, join the U.S. Attorney’s Office in making the announcement.

Nachiket Banwari, 36, of Charlotte, was sentenced to 30 months in prison followed by three years of supervised release. Hunter G. Mello, 42, of Sandwich, Massachusetts, was ordered to serve 40 months in prison followed by three years of supervised release. Richard Paul Nolan, 60, of Colorado Springs, Colorado, was sentenced to 24 months in prison followed by three years of supervised release.  The Court ordered the defendants to collectively forfeit $3,711,000 in proceeds from the scheme.

According to court records, Banwari, Mello, Nolan, and others were part of a conspiracy that carried out an international internet technical support fraud scam targeting victims, many of whom were elderly, in the United States and elsewhere. Internet pop-up “ads” were a central part of the conspiracy’s tech support scam. The malicious pop-ups suddenly appeared on victims’ screens and froze their computers.  The pop-ups contained misrepresentations designed to trick the victims into believing their computers had been infected with a virus and needed technical support to fix the problem. The pop-ups instructed victims to call the number in the pop ups to receive technical support. The numbers connected the victims to various Republic of India-based call centers who misrepresented themselves as Microsoft and further misrepresented the presence of viruses or other computer issues to induce the victims to pay hundreds or even thousands of dollars for technical support to “fix” the non-existent computer problems. No technical support was actually provided.  The scheme tricked millions of U.S.-based computer users into calling the call centers.

Banwari worked for Capstone Technologies (Capstone), a company headquartered in Charlotte.  Capstone used malicious pop-ups and a Republic of India-based call center to commit technical support fraud as described above. Through this scheme, Capstone defrauded thousands of victims throughout the United States of more than $7 million. For his participation in the scheme, Banwari received three percent of the Capstone revenue, or $222,334.

Mello was a broker of pop-up call leads to call centers in the Republic of India. In other words, Mello worked with the pop-up creators or “publishers” to sell pop-up calls to various call centers, including Capstone. Mello was paid a fee by the pop-up publishers for his sales. Mello generated over $20 million in sales of pop-ups to call centers. Mello also used his financial accounts to transfer proceeds of tech support fraud to publishers’ overseas bank accounts. Mello profited as much as $2 million from the scheme.

Nolan participated in the tech support scheme by creating and operating a platform called TrackDrive to route technical support fraud calls to the call centers, including Capstone. Nolan worked with pop-up publishers to ensure that the pop-ups effectively locked victim computers and displayed the correct call center routing numbers. Nolan’s TrackDrive platform routed approximately 15 million calls to call centers from the pop-ups. Nolan received a fee per call routed on his platform. Nolan also used his financial accounts to transfer proceeds of tech support fraud to publishers’ overseas bank accounts. Nolan profited approximately $2 million from the scheme. The total loss amount associated with Nolan in this scheme is approximately $19 million.

The FBI Charlotte Field Office conducted the investigation into Banwari. The FBI Nashville Field Office – Knoxville Resident Agency, led the investigation into Mello and Nolan.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Warren of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Charlotte is prosecuting the cases. Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Eric Frick of the U.S. Attorney’s Office assisted in prosecuting Banwari.