Fraudulent appropriation of property, causing damage of nearly 11 billion VND in Nghe An

All kinds of scams

According to the leaders of the Criminal Police Department of Nghe An Province Police and the Police of districts, cities and towns, in 2019, the whole province had 40 cases of fraud and property appropriation, causing a loss of nearly 11 billion VND. The authorities continuously received reports from people about people impersonating police officers and relatives of central officials to scam them into "running jobs", "running regimes"...

Defendant Le Quang Hoa at the trial. Photo: Tran Vu

Typically, in August 2019, the People's Court of Nghe An province sentenced defendant Le Quang Hoa (born in 1980), residing in Bong Khe commune, Con Cuong district, to 17 years in prison for the crime of "Fraudulent appropriation of property". The method that Hoa used was to impersonate an official of the Department of Home Affairs of Nghe An province or an officer of the Vinh City Police Department, having close relationships with people with positions and powers in the Departments, branches and sectors of the People's Committee of Nghe An province, so he could apply for jobs for many people in state agencies in the province, and apply for job transfers from provinces and cities nationwide to Nghe An. With the above method, from April 2016 to December 2018, Le Quang Hoa defrauded and appropriated the property of 11 people in Nghe An and Ha Tinh provinces with an amount of nearly 3 billion VND.

Or the case of Cao Thi Thanh Vinh (1983, residing in Le Mao Ward, Vinh City, Nghe An) is an employee of the Administrative Organization Department, North Central Geological Federation, but wherever Vinh goes, she impersonates Cao Thi Dieu Linh, an officer of the Economic Police Department - Ministry of Public Security. Vinh's impersonation is not only to "show off" but also to defraud and appropriate property by the trick of "running errands". With this trick, Cao Thi Thanh Vinh has "trapped" many families who need to "run errands" for their children to defraud and appropriate more than 400 million VND in property for personal use.

Subject Cao Thi Thanh Vinh. Photo source CNAD

Job scams are no longer a new problem, mostly “old dramas repeat themselves”. However, the familiar trick of bragging about “fake” relationships and gradually luring gullible “prey” into the trap is still effectively applied by bad guys. From the cases that have been discovered by the authorities, it shows that job scams are still fertile ground for scammers to operate.

As for those who are knowledgeable about information technology, their tricks are much more sophisticated. Although there have been many warnings, high-tech fraud crimes are still complicated and cause serious damage to many people.Meanwhile, the fight against this crime is still facing many difficulties due to the extremely sophisticated methods and tricks of the subjects, and the scope of activities is highly anonymous. All transactions and fraudulent activities take place in the virtual world, while a part of the victims are afraid and ashamed, so they do not report it.

Returning to the fraud case using the trick of appropriating Facebook accounts that Vinh City Police eradicated in mid-2019, the leader was Nguyen Huu Tien (born in 1995), residing in Ward 2, Quang Tri Town, Quang Tri Province. The task force spent 6 months searching for the perpetrator. Under Tien's direction, 12 young men living and working in Da Nang committed fraud nationwide, all of their money transfers were made via internet banking.

According to investigation documents, the subjects operated from 2017 until the time of arrest in April 2019, they had appropriated more than 500 Facebook accounts, appropriated more than 10 billion VND, the victims were mainly from Nghe An. The investigation team determined that this was not a new trick, even very common. However, many social network users still "fell into the trap" because the subjects had learned and researched the relationship between Facebook owners and friends through the message section. After taking over the user rights by changing the password, the subjects would stage a drama of borrowing money because of urgent matters.

Similarly, at the end of September 2019, Thanh Chuong District Police arrested Le The Hoang, born in 1995, residing in Village 7, Quang Minh Commune, Sam Son City, Thanh Hoa Province) for forging bank messages to appropriate 162 million VND from Ms. Le Thi D. (born in 1993, residing in Hanh Lam Commune, Thanh Chuong District). According to his confession, the subject often went online, visited other people's Facebook pages, Zalo..., and then learned about their personal information. Then, by using telecommunications devices and mobile phones to contact the victim and ask them to transfer money to their accounts, when the victim agreed, the subject created messages similar to the syntax of banks with the content that money had been transferred to the victim's account, making the victim mistakenly believe that she had received the money and immediately transferred that amount to the subject to receive a commission.

Recently, the Criminal Police Department of Nghe An Province Police issued a warning notice about a new scam that has caused many people to fall into the trap. Previously, many people in Nghe An Province received "Summons", "Arrest warrant for temporary detention" or other orders and decisions of the Court, the Procuracy, and Investigation Agencies at all levels)... via Zalo and Facebook, while the recipients themselves did not commit any violations. Many people, out of fear, transferred more than 4 billion VND to scammers after receiving "Arrest warrant for temporary detention" via Zalo.

Nghe An police confirmed that these documents are fake. Previously, there have been many scams through calls claiming to be from the Police, the Procuracy, etc., asking victims to transfer money to prove their innocence. To create trust for victims, the subjects even used software and phone applications over the Internet to fake the incoming call number as the phone number of the Police or State agencies, so when the victims checked through the 1080 switchboard or the Internet, they could not detect it.

Actively fight and prevent

Faced with the increase and complicated developments of crimes using high technology to commit fraud, in recent times, Nghe An Police have strengthened their direction and drastically implemented many solutions to proactively combat this type of crime. In particular, strictly implementing Official Dispatch No. 8441/UBND November 28, 2019 of Nghe An Provincial People's Committee on strengthening the prevention and handling of fraudulent activities in society, the leaders of Nghe An Provincial Police require the Police of units and localities to grasp the methods and tricks of fraud to propagate and raise awareness for relatives, families, friends and people to know and raise vigilance.

Evidence of a technology scam. Photo: Minh Tam

Through the launching of the mass movement to protect national security, the police force always advises people to be cautious when making friends, sharing information, conducting commercial transactions on the internet, websites; participating in capital mobilization, multi-level marketing... If you suspect or discover any individual or organization showing signs of fraud, you should immediately report it to the nearest police agency for handling. At the same time, propagate and mobilize cadres, employees, workers and people to strictly comply with the provisions of the law in registering and using mobile subscriptions, internet services, enhancing security features of social network accounts, bank accounts... to prevent subjects from taking advantage of this to commit fraud.

A gang that specializes in hacking and taking control of social network accounts to defraud and appropriate billions of dong from Facebook account owners was busted by Vinh City Police in April 2019. Photo: Minh Tam

At the same time, synchronously deploy professional measures, promptly detect, investigate, clarify, and strictly handle subjects with fraudulent behavior to appropriate assets and related violations. During the investigation, investigators also paid attention to clarifying the causes and conditions for the occurrence of fraudulent crimes, drawing out the laws of criminal activities and recommending competent authorities to direct measures to overcome and prevent crimes. Timely detect, investigate, clarify, and strictly handle related violations such as: debt collection, property extortion, disturbing public order, intentional injury, etc.

In addition, Nghe An Provincial Police have been coordinating with relevant units to establish an interdisciplinary force to conduct inspections of telecommunications and internet service providers in the province regarding compliance with legal regulations in the registration and management of prepaid mobile subscribers and internet subscribers... Strengthening the State management function over websites, social networking sites, and junk SIM cards suspected of being involved in fraudulent property appropriation activities.

Minh Tam