New scam to scam mobile subscribers

By impersonating users and texting to ask to buy phone SIM cards at high prices, the 19006759 hotline scammed users, deducting up to 15,000 VND from the victims in just a few seconds when they called back to "transact".

A message to lure calls to hotline 19006759 was sent to Mr. Hoang's phone. Photo: Nguyen Duc

On the morning of May 21, Mr. Xuan Hoang (Cau Giay, Hanoi) suddenly received an SMS message sent from phone number 01245141388 with the content: "Urgently need to buy your phone number 091XXX today for 2.5 million, please call 19006759 for transaction instructions and to meet the customer who needs to buy".

Seeing his "low-class" mobile phone number suddenly being offered for 2.5 million VND, Mr. Hoang immediately called back to see what was true.

However, instead of meeting the customer who needed to buy as the message "entices", Mr. Hoang only heard a male voice advertising this as a "nationwide beautiful SIM number service" with background music.

Then, feeling guilty and checking his account, Mr. Hoang discovered that within the first few seconds of listening to music when calling the hotline 19006759, the amount in his phone account had been deducted by 15,000 VND.

Through ICTnews's actual verification of the 19006759 switchboard, if calling this switchboard, mobile subscribers will be immediately deducted 15,000 VND for just the first few seconds of listening to the phone, just like the case of Mr. Xuan Hoang.

In fact, over the past time, the act of defrauding mobile users by impersonating missed calls, or sending fake messages giving gifts, songs, sending confessions... to phone subscribers has been reported a lot in the press. However, setting up scams like the 19006759 switchboard is a new form, more sophisticated when it comes to economic benefits to lure gullible mobile users into falling for the trick.

On May 22, ICTnews transferred information about the incident to the Inspectorate of the Ministry of Information and Communications so that the authorities could promptly handle this fraudulent behavior.

According to Thanh Nien