Hacking someone else's Facebook, stealing nearly 300 million VND

In this case, Tinh's methods were very sophisticated. He hacked the Facebook accounts of the victims' acquaintances, then chatted with them to make them believe they were friends and then tricked them into borrowing money and embezzling 300 million VND.

The case originated from a complaint by Ms. Pham Thi Mai (residing in Bac Son, Quang Trung ward, Hai Duong city, Hai Duong province) sent to the Criminal Police Department of Hai Duong Provincial Police.

According to Ms. Mai’s statement, her Facebook account is “Maipham”. One time Ms. Lan used her account, a person using the Facebook account “Thu Dinh” came in to chat with Ms. Mai. Thinking that she was talking to her friend, Mr. Dinh Xuan Thu, 61 years old, currently residing in Germany, the victim happily chatted.

Through an exchange on Facebook Messenger, Facebook user “Thu Dinh” asked Ms. Mai to lend her 330,000,000 VND. Ms. Mai agreed. Facebook user “Thu Dinh” provided Ms. Mai with 2 bank accounts under the name Nguyen Van Linh and an account under the name Bui Van Tai Thanh.

Subject Nguyen Xuan Tinh.

On October 2, Ms. Mai called Mr. Thu's wife via Facebook Messenger and was informed by Mr. Thu that his Facebook account "Thu Dinh" had been taken over by someone else before October 1. At this point, Ms. Mai realized she had been scammed, so on November 17, she went to the police station to report the incident.

After receiving the information, the Criminal Police Department of Hai Duong Provincial Police organized an investigation force.

Sharing with us, Colonel Cu Ngoc Nam, Head of the Criminal Police Department of Hai Duong Province Police, said: In this case, the victim and the suspect knew each other on the internet, so the search was difficult. However, through professional measures, the Criminal Police Department of Hai Duong Province Police arrested the perpetrator, Nguyen Xuan Tinh, a drug addict with no stable job.

Around May 2018, Tinh researched ways to take over Facebook accounts on the internet, then impersonated the account owner to trick others into transferring money into the account, then appropriated and laundered the money by buying virtual currency....

Tinh went to the website google.com to search for advertising software on plus24h.com, which is a Facebook Marketing advertising site. Then, he hired software to scan the list of Vietnamese Facebook users living and settling abroad, with the purpose of hacking (taking control of) their Facebook accounts.

Next, Tinh searched the list of Facebook accounts with registered ID (login name) as mail.yahoo, then accessed the website of yahoo.com, with the purpose of finding mail.yahoo which no longer existed. Tinh proceeded to create a mail (email box) with the same name as the Facebook ID.

Tinh used the newly created mail.yahoo to log in to the Facebook address on the Facebook.com page, went to the forgot password section so that the Facebook system could send the password to Tinh's newly created mail. Tinh used this password to log in to the user's Facebook account and took over the Facebook account's usage rights.

Next, the subject went into Facebook's Messenger software to read the content of the Facebook owner's messages with his friends. From the content of these messages, Tinh found the subject who texted the account owner, learned how to text, and from there, scammed their money.

In this way, around May 2018, Tinh took over the Facebook usage rights of many different people, including the account named "Le My Phung" of Ms. Le My Phung, born in 1988 in Kien Giang province, currently living in Korea.

From the Facebook account “Le My Phung”, Tinh sent messages to the Facebook account “Thu Hien” of Ms. Pham Thi Thu Hien, 28 years old, in Trung Tru village, Ninh Giang, Hoa Lu, Ninh Binh to trick Ms. Hien into opening a bank account. Ms. Hien asked her husband, Mr. Bui Van Tai Thanh, 30 years old, in Trung Tru, Ninh Giang, Hoa Lu, Ninh Binh to open a bank account.

Then, Tinh sent the phone number 0932523337 that he was using for Thanh to register for Internet Banking service. After opening a bank account, Thanh asked Hien to text Tinh via Messenger with the account number and password.

After checking and seeing that it was correct, Tinh opened a sub-account from Thanh's account under the name Bui Van Tai Thanh, the phone number registered for Internet Banking service is 0932523337.

Around the end of June, beginning of July 2018, Tinh went to the house of Phan Thao Nguyen, 23 years old, residing at 109 Ngo Quyen, Ward 3, Quang Tri town, Quang Tri province to meet Phan Quoc Viet, 24 years old, residing at 71 Le Hong Phong, Ward 3, Quang Tri town, Quang Tri province.

Here, Viet discussed with Tinh about laundering the fraudulent money by transferring the stolen money into a bank account that Tinh was managing. Then, Tinh bought virtual currency, then sold it and transferred the money to Viet. Tinh agreed and agreed with Viet that when transferring money into Tinh's account, Viet would pay Tinh 10% of the transferred amount. Then, Tinh sent Viet the information of a bank account under the name of Bui Van Tai Thanh that Tinh was managing.

On October 1, Ms. Pham Thi Mai sent a message via Messenger to the Facebook account “Thu Dinh” of Mr. Dinh Xuan Thu, who is Ms. Mai’s friend currently living in Germany. The user of the Facebook account “Thu Dinh” asked Ms. Mai to transfer money to the account number under the name Nguyen Van Linh in the amount of 130,000,000 VND; to the account number under the name Bui Van Tai Thanh in the amount of 200,000,000 VND (accounts managed and used by Tinh), promising to return the entire amount by 3:00 p.m. on October 2.

At 3:00 p.m. on October 2, 2018, Ms. Mai did not see Mr. Thu's account transfer the money as agreed. Ms. Mai called Ms. Lien, Mr. Thu's wife currently living in Germany, via the Facebook account "Bich Lien" and then realized she had been scammed.