A man in China purchased 4,600 phones to artificially inflate livestream viewer counts, earning $415,000 in less than four months. Whang, as he is known, has been sentenced to one year and three months in prison and fined 50,000 yuan (approximately $7,000) for illegal commercial activities.
Wang’s scheme began in late 2022 when a friend introduced him to a lucrative practice known as “brushing.” This term refers to simulating real-time viewer interactions such as viewer counts, likes, comments, and shares in livestreams to deceive consumers.
Extensive Use of Equipment and Services
To execute his plan, the Chinese fraudster purchased 4,600 mobile phones controlled by specialized cloud software. He also acquired VPN services, routers, and switches from a tech company based in Changsha, Hunan province. This setup allowed him to direct all the phones simultaneously to a livestream target with just a few clicks on his computer, thereby boosting viewer numbers and interactions.
Wang mentioned that the daily cost of using each phone was less than a dollar. He explained that the final service fee depended on the duration each phone stayed active in the livestream and the number of phones activated. By March of last year, he had earned approximately $415,000 by selling this service to livestreamers looking to enhance their online presence. Wang also revealed that he bought fake viewer accounts in bulk from others and sourced the phones from the second-hand recycling market.