To prevent frauds, where the government is making various changes about ticket booking, a big ‘fraud’ associated with it has been revealed. India Today’s Osint team has identified an online racket active on Telegram and WhatsApp. Where IRCTC, a network of more than 40 groups, is active about immediate ticket booking. These groups claim ticket booking in 60 seconds using bots and base-verified IRCTC accounts, which has put the data of users at risk. Even after changing the rules of immediate ticket booking by the government, these groups have also become active.
It is only one part of the large online black market for e-ticketing, where thousands of agents appear active. Even after the implementation of government rules, their business is spreading rapidly. It has been revealed in the report that the booking window open is an immediate ticket booking window open 24 hours before the train is released. In such a situation, Tatkal Ticket Book is often done by bots or agents in a few seconds, due to which ordinary citizens are unable to book tickets.
This game started immediately after the new rule
The report has revealed that as soon as the Railway Ministry announced that from July 1, only Aadhaar Athentified users will be able to book through the IRCTC website or app. Soon after that, the e-ticketing racket on social media channels started selling Aadhaar-verified IRCTC ID and OTP to both agents and buyers.
Racket busted
Not only the agent, the e-ticketing racket also includes technology experts and fake services, who allegedly take advantage of flaws in the IRCTC system, and claim to book Tatkal Ticket in 60 seconds through suspected telegram and WhatsApp account. To hide their identity, the admin of this group uses the international number.
IRCTC account being sold for Rs 360
According to the report of India Today, the Aadhaar Verified IRCTC user ID is being openly sold only Rs 360. These accounts are being used to generate OTP to book tickets immediately. This work is not manual, but claims to increase the speed of agent booking and use bottom or automatic browser exertions to overload the system for real users.
How do you book tickets immediately?
India Today, to understand the way the racket is working in detail, closely examined the activity for more than three months inside one of the Telegram Group ‘Fast Tatki Software’, so that their ticket operations could be understood. Then what came to know was surprising … Actually, the racket operator or technical masterminds behind the illegal network are selling bots to agents. Agents are asked to use these bots to install their browser and use autofil service to complete booking soon, which fails to book real IRCTC users tickets.
How the Black Market of E-Ticketing works
A video shared by the operator has made the picture more clear. In which it is showing that the bot allegedly autofils the IRCTC login credential, train details, passenger information and payment data. The entire process is automatic and there is a ‘guarantee’ to secure confirmed tickets in less than a minute.
The conversation in the channel shows that technical experts guide agents to avoid IRCTC’s AI algorithm, which blocks the IP address. To hide their IP address, they dodge these blocks by using virtual private servers (VPS). Some operators also claim that they are designing service to keep the bot completely safe.
Not only booking, data is also being stolen
India Today also found that the racket’s admin is running a fully designed website selling bots like Dragon, JetX, Ocean, Black Turbo and Formula One, which is sold for ‘immediate booking’ and which costs between ₹ 999 to ₹ 5,000. After purchasing, users are directed through telegram channels how to use them. These bots are not only used to book tickets, but they steal the personal information of users.
The melware analysis of the bot file called Winzip, downloaded as APK, was performed using the melware scanner site virustotal. The analysis showed that it was Trojan, which was designed to steal the user information.
More than 2.5 crore fake user ID suspended
On June 04, the Ministry of Railways announced that during the first five minutes of immediate booking, ‘Bot traffic is up to 50% of the total login efforts’. The ministry said that more than 2.5 crore fake user IDs have been suspended due to the deployment of anti-boat systems by IRCTC. Apart from this, now the agent booking has been banned during the first 30 minutes of opening Tatkal tickets for both AC and non-AC categories.
(Associate Khushi Sonkar)
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