Beware of cyber scams using fake summer courses

On May 16, the Department of Education and Training issued a document warning against cyber fraud in the form of fake summer courses.

Previously, according to the Department of Education and Training, from information from Nghe An Provincial Police, recently, the Provincial Police discovered a method of taking advantage of the social network Facebook to commit fraud and appropriate property in the form of introducing and consulting parents to register their children to participate in courses,experiential activities, practice in the summer.

Through the social network Facebook, the subjects created many personal accounts and fanpages such as: "Military Summer", "Summer Retreat", "Chess Course", "Marathon Training Course", "Child Talent Competition"... to advertise and introduce to parents to learn and register. To complete the steps, the subjects asked parents to perform a number of "tasks" with the aim of "increasing interaction for brands and sponsoring brands" such as clicking "like" and "share" on articles and product photos of sponsors, "depositing" and "withdrawing" money through electronic banking applications according to the amounts requested by the subjects and joining closed groups on applications such as Telegram, Viber, Zalo...

Also according to Nghe An Provincial Police, when performing the first tasks with a small amount of money required to be deposited, under 1 million VND, the withdrawal is done quickly, with a commission (usually 10%) to create trust.

Then, when depositing a larger amount, the subjects announced a number of reasons for not being able to withdraw the money such as: paying taxes, wrong operations, increasing the limit... and required depositing more money to be able to withdraw the money.

Some victims, wanting to withdraw the money they had deposited, continued to transfer more money into the subjects' accounts.

With this trick, the subjects have appropriated a huge amount of money from many victims across the country. In addition, chat groups on applications such as Telegram, Viber, Zalo... are set up by the subjects to arrange many "decoy" accounts pretending to be parents to text and send positive information to the group, in order to create trust, manipulate psychology, and entice victims to transfer money.

To prevent criminals from using high technology to commit fraud and appropriation of property with the above method, the Department of Education and Training requires educational institutions to inform parents and students about the methods and tricks of criminals to raise awareness and proactively prevent through forms such as: distributing leaflets, notifying parents at the year-end parent meeting; sending notices to parent groups on the social network Facebook Zalo, posting propaganda articles on the school's fanpage and the Education sector.

In addition, parents are advised to carefully research the center and facility that organizes the classes if they register their children for summer study and training courses, and must have a clear address in the area to register; do not register online to avoid being scammed. If registering at life skills education centers, they need to carefully research the center/facility that is qualified to operate and licensed by the Department of Education and Training.

In case of detecting signs of fraud in organizations or individuals organizing training courses for students, it is necessary to promptly notify the nearest police agency to receive information, organize verification and handle according to regulations.

The Department of Education and Training also noted that for experiential classes, the department has only coordinated with the Provincial Youth Union to organize the "Military Semester" class and is coordinating with the Provincial Police to organize the "Police Semester" class.

The Department also allows the Nghe An Center for Continuing Education and Vocational Guidance to organize life skills classes and experiential activities.