Fake police call to scam billions

When asked by a person claiming to be a police officer to transfer all the money in his account to "verify the money was clean", Mr. Lam transferred 800 million VND, and Ms. Duong transferred nearly 500 million.

Police in District 3, Ho Chi Minh City said that recently in the district, there have been a series of cases of people being scammed by a group of people calling pretending to be police officers.

Specifically, on the afternoon of November 9, Mr. Lam (59 years old, in Ward 2, District 3) reported being scammed of more than 800 million VND.

That same morning, a woman called to inform him that he owed nearly 9 million VND in landline phone bills. When Mr. Lam questioned her, she instructed him to call back and press 0 to speak to an officer for an explanation.

Police notice sent to each household. Photo: Khanh Trung.

While following the instructions, he met a person who claimed to be Le Thi Kim Chi. Ms. Chi told him to impersonate a phone number with an area code in Hanoi and then instructed him to meet Dinh Quoc Bao - a person who claimed to be a lieutenant of the Hanoi City Police.

Bao said he was investigating a ring of bank employees and some police officers who were buying and selling personal records to commit fraud. Among the suspects under investigation was Mr. Lam.

Bao then connected Mr. Lam to talk to his "boss" named Phong. Phong instructed Mr. Lam to withdraw all the money in his savings account and exchange foreign currency into Vietnamese Dong, depositing it into the account number of "state inspector" Hoang Quoc Viet. After 24 hours of verification, Viet would return the money to the owner along with a fee of 200,000 VND.

Phone scam gangs have been caught by the police. Photo: Provided by the police.

Believing this was a state account number, Mr. Lam withdrew 800 million VND to deposit it. Many hours later, realizing he had been scammed, the victim went to the police to report the matter.

Three days later, Ms. Duong (72 years old, in District 3) also went to the police to report being scammed of nearly 500 million VND using the above method.

District 3 police have sent notices to the People's Committees of 14 wards in the area to warn each household about this trick. Authorities recommend that if people encounter similar cases, they should report them to the nearest police station.

In mid-2014, the Ho Chi Minh City Police Department sent a text message to each citizen's phone number warning them that "When investigating a case, police and prosecutors should not arbitrarily confiscate money or work with people over the phone. People are requested to absolutely not transfer money to strangers' accounts."

*The names of the victims have been changed.

According to zing