Sophisticated Canon impersonators ij.start-canon.com

Scams Tech Support Scam
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1

Scam Number: Unknown
Scammer’s Website or Email: https://ij.start-canon.com/
Additional information about this scam: This is the usual printer setup impersonation scam with a few sophisticated or bold twists. Any search for printer information leads visitors to the website to a paywall, where they are expected to sign up front for a monthly fee by credit card for “services” that are free from the genuine Canon site – downloading drivers and reading product manuals, etc.

Also has an “AI” chatbot that seems to be trained on the Canon manuals.

The payment screen seems to actually validate credit card info, as it rejects spoofed numbers from fakenamegenerator.com.

And the website hosted on the parent domain … wow!

https://start-canon.com/

Screenshot From 2024-11-02 06-16-45
Screenshot From 2024-11-02 06-16-451155×1031 78.1 KB

On the same IP address 157.173.209.25 is what looks like an abandoned WordPress template site that has an interesting title, “Canon Staging” : https://octaonetworks.com/ .

LOL look at this brazen foolishness: Tech Support Fraud/Scam Prevention – ij.start.canon | ij.start.canon/connect | Canon Printer Driver

(Meanwhile their web-chat scammer is literally named “James from Canon”.)

2

Interesting location on this call, I’ve come across this local only 3 other time…
IP Details.103.170.68.245

Country India
Continent Asia
Region Rajasthan
City Kota
ZIP 324001
Timezone Asia/Kolkata
Internet Service Provider (ISP) Radinet Info Solutions Private Limited
Organization Uniqenter
AS number and name AS138277 Radinet Info Solutions Private Limited 
"ip": "103.170.68.245",
    "security": {
        "vpn": false,
        "proxy": false,
        "tor": false,
        "relay": false
    },
    "location": {
        "city": "",
        "region": "",
        "country": "India",
        "continent": "Asia",
        "region_code": "",
        "country_code": "IN",
        "continent_code": "AS",
        "latitude": "21.9974",
        "longitude": "79.0011",
        "time_zone": "Asia/Kolkata",
        "locale_code": "en",
        "metro_code": "",
        "is_in_european_union": false
    },
    "network": {
        "network": "103.170.68.0/23",
        "autonomous_system_number": "AS138277",
        "autonomous_system_organization": "Radinet Info Solutions Private Limited"
    }
3

And whaddyaknow, HP printer setup is a subdomain of Canon printer setup!

Scammer’s “HP” paywall: Register - 123.hp.com/setup

4

One more on this topic: just look at this brazenness! They want people to “invest” in their scam!

Now skimming over the nonsense biz-boilerplate blabbering, we find “Contact us at [email protected]” – no public and active website at the url (403 forbidden error), and elsewhere (but on the same IP address as canonetworks.com coincidentally).

5

Still running in 2026. I’m not giving them my credit card just to talk to them on the phone.

2026 chutzpah award for this from their linkedin page:

Exclusive scam awareness content, helping users identify and avoid fraudulent “tech support” activities.

https://www.linkedin.com/company/ijstartcanon/about/

Additionally, the footer of the site links an interesting Github account: watranosmv · GitHub