Answering the phone cost... nearly 800 million
Using the trick of impersonating law enforcement officers, the subjects called landline numbers, accusing the subscriber of being involved in a criminal ring they were investigating. The three latest victims of this scam were scammed out of nearly 800 million VND.
The most recent victim of this phone money transfer scam is Ms. NTN, residing in Van Mieu Ward, Nam Dinh City. According to Ms. NTN's report, at around 8:00 a.m. on April 4, 2016, someone claiming to be a post office employee called Ms. N's landline phone number to inform her that the phone bill for her home phone was 8.93 million VND and asked her to pay immediately or else the phone number would be deleted.
This “post office employee” also told Ms. N that a person residing in Hai Yen Ward, Mong Cai City had obtained her ID card and used it to open a bank account. This person was recently arrested by the police and confessed to having carried out money laundering activities with Ms. N.
Then the "post office employee" instructed Ms. N to call a "police officer" and a "People's Procuracy officer" of Quang Ninh province to clear her name of any involvement in money laundering!?.
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| Nam Dinh City Police inspect the evidence seized from the subjects who swindled money transfers via phone. |
As instructed, Ms. N immediately called the "police officer and the Quang Ninh People's Procuracy officer" that the "post office employee" had just provided and was asked by them to deposit 468 million VND of her family's savings into Luc Huu Chien's account at Agribank Phuc Hoa, Cao Bang to confirm her innocence.
Ms. N. immediately asserted that she had done nothing illegal and was determined not to transfer the money. The "officer" immediately threatened to detain her for 2 months for investigation. Hearing this, Ms. N. panicked, then went to the bank to transfer 468 million VND of her family's savings into an account under the name of Luc Huu Chien with the "prosecution officer's" promise that if she was truly innocent, the money would be returned to her within 24 hours.
After transferring the money, Mrs. N. woke up and checked her account to find that all the money had been withdrawn. Using the same trick, in Nam Dinh city, there was another male victim who was scammed out of 100 million VND and another male victim in Xuan Truong district who was scammed out of 160 million VND.
Immediately upon receiving the victim's report, the Board of Directors of Nam Dinh Provincial Police directed the Criminal Police Team and Nam Dinh City Police to urgently collect information and clarify the truth of the incident to reassure public opinion as well as raise people's vigilance.
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| A victim reported to Nam Dinh Provincial Police. |
The suspects in the ring residing in Cao Bang district gradually revealed themselves. However, these were just people who were asked by the scammers to borrow their bank accounts to act as intermediaries to transfer money. They said that a foreigner asked them for their account numbers to transfer money.
When they have money, this foreigner will call them to withdraw it, then transfer the money to other accounts or hand it over directly to the subject. Each time they transfer money, they are paid 1 million VND. Currently, Nam Dinh Provincial Police are urgently searching for and determining the exact identity of the masterminds.
To help people proactively prevent and avoid being "trapped" by phone scammers, the police agency recommends that people be cautious when receiving phone calls from strangers. In case someone claims to be a police officer, people should request to directly contact the local police to send an invitation or summons to the office, not to work over the phone. People should not provide their private phone numbers, personal information, ID numbers, credit cards, and account numbers to anyone without knowing who they are and what they will use them for; do not buy, sell, or lend ID cards, and do not post personal information on social networking sites. When receiving strange or suspicious calls, people should immediately notify the police; do not handle the matter yourself because you will fall into the trap of criminals' fraudulent behavior. |
According to CAND
