Warning about various types of scams that trap many people.

TCreating fake money transfer payment slips

At 8:00 AM on March 12, 2025, the police in Hung Nguyen town, Hung Nguyen district, received a complaint from Ms. TTC (born in 2006), residing in Van Yen district, Yen Bai province, and temporarily residing in Hung Nguyen town, regarding being defrauded of 10 million VND by an individual who created fake payment slips to steal her money.

Just three hours after receiving the report, and after identifying and investigating the suspect, the Hung Nguyen Town Police summoned Nguyen Quang Chinh (born in 2001), residing in Gia Hanh commune, Can Loc district, Ha Tinh province - the suspected individual - to the police station for questioning.

At the police station, Chinh was stubborn and tried every way to evade responsibility and deny the crime. However, faced with the documents and evidence collected by the investigators, the suspect admitted to the crime. Chinh confessed that he and Ms. C. had known each other before.

Due to laziness and lack of stable employment, the suspect conceived the idea of ​​defrauding Ms. C. by using a mobile application to create a fake money transfer receipt for 10 million VND from another account to Ms. C.'s account and showing it to her. Afterward, Chinh asked Ms. C. to transfer the money back to him. The suspect used all of the money for personal expenses.

Currently, the Investigation Police Department of Nghe An province has initiated a criminal case and indicted Nguyen Quang Chinh for the crime of fraud and appropriation of property.

Previously, in October 2024, Ho Tran Quoc Khanh (born in 2003, residing in Yen Thanh district, Nghe An province) was also prosecuted for a similar crime. According to the police in Bac Tu Liem district (Hanoi), Khanh was a student at a university in Hanoi. He discovered that Pham Thi H., a delivery driver for the e-commerce platform S, had a habit of only checking the successful transfer notification on the customer's phone, without verifying whether her own account had received the money.

Khanh came up with the idea of ​​committing fraud by forging images of successful bank transfer confirmations on banking apps to steal money.

According to the report, Khanh ordered a Xiaomi 14 T Pro phone from the e-commerce platform S. He then asked someone to create a fake image confirming a successful bank transfer of 13,805,000 VND. When receiving the phone, and Ms. H. presented the QR code for the transfer, Khanh pretended to scan the code and showed Ms. H. the fake successful transfer image before leaving. About 20 minutes later, seeing no transaction from Khanh, Ms. H. reported the incident to the police.

McreateThe shipper and shop owner tricked the customer into transferring money in advance.

Besides creating counterfeit payment slips, recently, taking advantage of online shopping and cashless payment services, many individuals have impersonated shippers and delivery personnel from shipping and express delivery companies to commit fraud.

Accordingly, scammers collect customer information from public comments or purchase customer information through various channels. They then impersonate delivery personnel to call for deliveries during business hours or when customers are not home.

If the recipient says they cannot receive the goods, the scammers will ask them to transfer money to pay for the order so they can send the goods to an acquaintance, neighbor, etc. After receiving the money, they continue to use various excuses such as sending the wrong payment account, then trick the victim into clicking on a link containing "malware" to gain control of the device and steal the victim's bank account and money before cutting off all contact.

In addition, Ms. KN, the owner of a shop specializing in Japanese domestic goods and sports training products on Nguyen Thi Minh Khai Street (Vinh City), said: There have been cases where customers placed orders on her personal page and were then contacted by scammers who impersonated her on Zalo to finalize orders and trick customers into transferring money to their accounts in advance, thus stealing their money. This prompted her to issue a warning on Facebook.

Impersonating electricity company employees

Another tactic recently used by these individuals is to impersonate electricity company employees, calling customers to inform them they owe electricity bills and threatening to cut off their power if they don't pay immediately. They then ask people to transfer money to a personal account or provide bank information to "settle the debt."

Additionally, the perpetrators send fake SMS messages or emails notifying victims of electricity bills, along with links to online payments or fake applications. If victims click on the link and fill in their information, the fraudsters will steal their credit card or bank account information.

Typically, on February 16, 2025, the Cyber ​​Security and High-Tech Crime Prevention Department received a report from Ms. PTH, residing in Nghi Huong ward, Vinh city, stating that at approximately 4 PM that day, she received a call from an unknown number claiming to be an electricity company employee, informing her that her family owed money for electricity.

Through the Zalo application, the perpetrators sent a link requesting Ms. H. to install the Epoint application (a fake application containing malware that takes control of the device) on her mobile phone. Because the perpetrators repeatedly urged and threatened to cut off her electricity, Ms. H. complied with their demands.

After performing some actions on the application, the perpetrators then asked Ms. H. to access bank A.'s application and use her citizen identification card to complete the payment process.

The perpetrators also sent sophisticated QR payment codes featuring the logo of EVN (Vietnam Electricity Corporation). Immediately afterward, two of Ms. H.'s bank accounts were automatically debited 92 million VND and over 600 million VND respectively.

The Cyber ​​Security and High-Tech Crime Prevention Department instructed Ms. H. on how to perform actions on her phone to stop the money transfer; at the same time, they instructed Ms. H. to report directly to the bank to promptly freeze the aforementioned amount. Notably, at that time, the perpetrators discovered that Ms. H. also had an online savings account, so they continued to carry out schemes to steal this money.

However, police officers promptly removed the malware and guided Ms. H. in setting up security for her bank account, preventing the fraudulent activities of the aforementioned individuals. By the morning of February 17, 2025, Ms. H. had received back nearly 700 million VND.

Manipulating sensitive images and videos for blackmail purposes.

Currently, the Ministry of Public Security is also continuously issuing warnings about criminals exploiting images and videos of citizens publicly available on the internet to edit and manipulate sensitive content for the purpose of threatening and extorting money. Accordingly, these criminals target victims who are economically well-off, have high social status, or are officials and civil servants within the political system.

The Ministry of Public Security advises people to be vigilant when receiving messages or calls with the above content; do not transfer money when threatened; and when detecting signs of fraud or extortion, quickly report to the nearest police station and report through the VneID application.

Proactive prevention

In Nghe An province, given the complex nature of fraud and property theft crimes, especially those using high technology that affect security and order, in recent times, in addition to coordinating with various departments and organizations to strengthen propaganda and warnings through various forms and gradually build a people's security network in cyberspace, functional forces have simultaneously implemented measures to prevent and combat fraud and property theft crimes, especially high-tech fraud.

At the same time, it is necessary to strengthen state management, thereby identifying the causes, conditions, methods, and tactics in order to implement effective measures to combat this type of crime.

In February 2025 alone, authorities in the province discovered 5 cases involving 18 individuals using high-tech methods, including 2 cases involving 3 individuals who committed fraud and misappropriation of property.

However, besides the involvement of relevant authorities, the most important factor remains the vigilance of the people. Therefore, law enforcement and related agencies advise people to absolutely not follow instructions or transfer money to strangers. Do not provide sensitive personal information in any form. Do not access payment links from unknown sources via text messages or emails; absolutely do not share your citizen identification card, bank account number, OTP code, password, etc., with strangers or people whose identities cannot be verified.

If you suspect you have been scammed, you should immediately report it to the authorities for assistance.