You can watch Kitboga on YouTube. He calls these centers and walks through the whole scam. Basically they use fear of an arrest to get the target to buy gift cards. It sounds dumb but it works on vulnerable members of society.
Sure. All I can recommend is to contact the EFF. They had some lawyers willing to work with us. The lawyer who did end up working with us was from California and specialized in patent trolls. I'm outside the office right now so I can't tell you specifically who it was
You may also be able to strike a deal with the patent trolls. We were able to take them down to 40k from 100k. That was still ridiculous for us but if you're paying a lawyer or paying the troll it's all the same to a business working on thin margins. We heard stories that they would accept as little as 10k.
For what it's worth the patent troll that targeted us is no longer operating under their original name. They were taken down by the EFF representing a vape company if I remember right.
We've been targeted by a patent troll and as a small business (less than 5 employees) it absolutely shook us to our core. Thankfully a lawyer took us up pro bono and the trolls backed off. I'm saddened to think of all the businesses that weren't as lucky. This needs to be fixed.