Couple forged money transfer slips, sophisticatedly embezzling money from network operators

The Criminal Police Department (Nghe An Provincial Police) has just issued a decision to prosecute the case, prosecuting two subjects for fraud and appropriation of property in the form of appropriation of telecommunications fees of Vinaphone network, initially proving the amount of money appropriated is nearly 200 million VND.

The subjects include Thai Lap Trung, born in 1986, residing in Vinh Quang ward, Rach Gia city, Kien Giang province and Du Duc Minh, born in 1988, residing in ward 12, district 12, Ho Chi Minh city. The task force seized evidence related to the crime including 02 mobile phones, 35 phone SIM cards, 03 fake seals, 10 fake ID cards, 75 bank transfer receipts, and more than 3 grams of crystal meth.

Two subjects Minh and Trung. Photo: Quynh Trang

Activate postpaid sim card by "shortcut"

Minh confessed that after finding the Facebook account of Mr. Nguyen Dinh Son, born in 1990, residing in Hung Phuc ward, Vinh city, an employee of Vinaphone Nghe An Company, Minh proactively contacted Mr. Son to discuss converting 04 SIM numbers into postpaid subscribers.

Mr. Son asked Minh to provide a photo of his ID card and transfer the connection fee to him in advance, an amount of 1 million VND.

The subjects provided fake ID numbers to Mr. Son. Minh continued to use a blank money transfer receipt from the Orient Commercial Bank (OCB) and wrote the money transfer content, cut and pasted the content "PAID HAS BEEN RECEIVED" with a stamp from another receipt, took a picture of the fake receipt and sent it to Mr. Son. Mr. Son trusted him and activated postpaid for 04 SIM numbers.

After successfully scamming for the first time, the subjects continued to discuss with Mr. Son to register for a postpaid network without having an ID card registered in Nghe An, but only needing the company's business registration certificate. With this method, the subjects defrauded Mr. Son of an additional 4 million VND in postpaid network registration fees for the next 28 SIM cards.

Misappropriation of telecommunication charges

After that, the subjects installed them on phones running the Android operating system, registered Google Play accounts, and selected the payment method through the postpaid SIM card fees. The subjects continued to log in to the game on the phone and then made deposits into the game until the payment limit of the SIM card for that month was exhausted, then the SIM card was discarded. With that method, from January 10 to January 12, 2018, the subjects appropriated nearly 178 million VND from 32 postpaid SIM cards of Vinaphone Nghe An Company.

At the investigation agency, the subjects confessed to buying fake ID cards at Hoang Hoa Tham market, Tan Binh district, Ho Chi Minh City. The representative of the Company's license was borrowed from someone else.