South Korea arrests phone scam group in Vietnam

South Korean media recently reported that the country's police coordinated with Vietnamese authorities to arrest 34 people in a telephone fraud ring, including 31 Koreans, 2 Vietnamese and 1 Chinese.

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Illustration photo. (Source: kunc.org)

According to the Seoul Metropolitan Police Department, the suspects in the above ring, led by a 32-year-old Korean man surnamed Kim, were arrested on charges of committing telephone fraud.

Their modus operandi was to set up a call center in Ho Chi Minh City, then impersonate Korean police officers, prosecutors, or bank employees and call individuals in Korea, convincing them that they were victims of a bank fraud and advising them to deposit money into their bank accounts immediately “or else their bank account balances could be lost.”

Using this trick, from April to September this year, they defrauded 210 Koreans of up to 490 million won (about 9.6 billion VND).

Seoul police also said they discovered the existence of the above fraud ring in Vietnam through investigating subjects arrested for illegal trading of bank books in Korea since last April.

Through cooperation between the Interpol police forces of Korea and Vietnam, the above agency requested the Vietnamese side to arrest the above criminal group on September 12.

A Seoul police official said the arrest of this fraud ring was especially meaningful because it was stopped in time before they could develop other lines in Vietnam and China and defraud more victims.

Currently, this agency is continuing to hunt down the remaining two suspects in the above ring, while expanding the investigation into the connection between the above ring and other criminal gangs in Vietnam and China.

Previously, in August, South Korean police also coordinated with Thai police to dismantle a similar scam ring in Phuket led by a Korean. This gang had defrauded about 500 million won from 39 South Koreans between July 2013 and June 2014.

According to the South Korean Supreme Prosecutors' Office, phone scams in the country have increased rapidly in recent years. Specifically, in 2012 there were 22,351 cases, while in 2014 this number increased to 35,859 cases.

According to observations by VNA reporters, on Vietnamese community pages in Korea recently, there have been many cases of Vietnamese brides warning about similar scams.

It is worth noting here that in the case of foreigners living in Korea, due to certain limitations in language and understanding of local laws, especially regulations on banking transactions, these people are more likely to become victims of the above scams.

Also related to the Vietnamese community in Korea, after the Korean police arrested Vietnamese people who participated in buying bank accounts of Vietnamese people legally residing in Korea and using them for illegal money transfers, some banks in Korea have imposed certain restrictions on Vietnamese citizens when conducting transactions through banks such as only allowing opening accounts after having a legal residence card in Korea, or allowing opening a bank book but requiring a certificate of immigration status or a commitment letter from the employer to make a credit card...

In Korea, lending your bank account to others to conduct transactions is considered illegal./.

According to vietnamplus.vn