Confessions of victims trapped in "love apps" and "dating apps" online

Mr. NVT (born in 1962, living in Tay Ninh), bitterly: Just because he trusted a young girl online, T. was scammed out of 3.4 billion VND at the end of 2024. Seeing that T. often went online to read news, the person who set her profile picture as a girl 20 years younger than her named Nhung, he added her to get to know her. Through following her on Facebook, T. saw that this girl had a beautiful appearance and a luxurious life. Notably, the girl often saved photos at famous tourist destinations, making T. and many others love and follow her. Next, Nhung asked about T.'s age, career, family background, hobbies... Every day, T. received messages asking about her feelings from this girl.

After that, Mr. T. texted Nhung many times. The messages became more and more affectionate like those of a couple in love. After gaining trust, Nhung lured Mr. T. into using a "love app". Next, the subject lured the victim to invest in buying and selling USDT cryptocurrency on the OKX exchange. Using the excuse that OKX had low investment profits, Nhung told Mr. T. to withdraw all the money from OKX to invest in the UTSpeed ​​exchange with an interest rate of 3 to 4%/day. With the enthusiastic guidance of Nhung and the customer service staff, Mr. T. transferred money 14 times with a total amount of 3.4 billion VND to invest but could not withdraw the money to his account. When Mr. T. contacted Nhung, he received a notification that the account did not exist.

In a similar situation, Ms. NTL (born in 1975, living in Dong Nai) was befriended by a handsome young man named Tan and scammed out of more than 150 million VND. Specifically, the subject often filmed scenes of her working out and traveling abroad, making Ms. L. fascinated. Although only 25 years old, Tan appeared to be a calm man, understanding Ms. L.'s family situation. In particular, knowing that Ms. L. was single and lacking in love, Tan also shared a story about "ageless love" that made Ms. L. not suspicious at all. Once he had gained trust, Tan introduced Ms. L. to "dating apps" to conveniently express his love.

Seeing that Ms. L. had fallen into the trap, Tan lured the victim to a virtual currency trading website with rewards of a friend who worked in a bank. Tan told Ms. L. that in difficult economic times, only investing in virtual currency would be profitable, especially with the official domain name of a reputable bank via social networks, customers could rest assured. Customers were given the option to place money at 3 levels, "Vip1, vip 2 and vip 3". Initially, Ms. L. entered vip 1, placing 10 million VND to receive 2 million VND in interest. Next, Tan lured her to place money in vip 2, otherwise she would not be able to get the old money and would give up. Like that, the money deposited continuously increased but she could not withdraw it. Knowing that she had fallen into a scam, Ms. L. stopped playing and asked T. to return the money, but the subject blocked her phone number. After that, the subject also texted Ms. L. to threaten her with many "junk SIMs", causing the victim to suffer a long-term mental breakdown.

Recently, on February 6, Tay Ninh Provincial Police coordinated with the Criminal Police Department (Ministry of Public Security) to dismantle a gang using the unique trick of "love apps" and "dating apps", then enticing victims to participate in investing, or accessing unique links to appropriate more than 500 billion VND. Through investigation so far, the Police have determined: In Bavet City, Svayrieng Province, Cambodia, Chinese subjects rented the 3rd and 4th floors, Building 11, Kim Sa 4 area to establish a company to conduct fraud and appropriate property in the form of using "love apps" called "2.1" app for short. At the same time, they bought the link "https://web.sandsking.top/#/" to lead to a website called "Casino Bay Sands" to serve the fraud and appropriate property activities. The above fraudulent company is directed by a Chinese person named HeYuki, and managed by A Lung. The staff are tightly organized, forming many groups and assigning specific roles and tasks to each department and member, such as: Management, backstage, sales, HR department, logistics... and dividing the 3rd floor area into 2 working groups A and B; and the 4th floor includes 9 working groups such as A, B, B 2.1, C, G, F, H, K, M. The staff working on the 3rd and 4th floors of building 11 mainly use computer networks, telecommunications networks, and electronic means to commit fraud.appropriation of propertyof the Vietnamese people.

Notably, in conversations and text messages with customers, employees will introduce themselves as working for large corporations and businesses, specializing in website design, maintaining casino business projects or online lottery sites at home and abroad to create trust. Employees will exploit information about customers' assets to forward to the sales team leader. During this period, customers will be lured by staff with false reasons such as having to go on a business trip to Singapore or Korea, so they will send a link asking customers to help them participate in betting or lottery... When customers agree to participate in betting, staff will create fake receipts to show customers how easy it is to win bets, plus the staff will provide information that: "During the day, the system on the Bay Sands casino app, called 2.1, will have errors 3 times, each time for 5 minutes. If you bet at that time, you will surely win a lot of money" with the purpose of luring customers into the trap, but in fact, this error was made by the company's backstage staff.

To prevent the above situation, the police agency recommends that people be vigilant about the tricks of "love apps" and "dating apps" to lure investment, avoid falling into the trap of bad guys. When participating in investment or working as a sales collaborator, people need to check the company's information through many different sources to verify the accuracy. When detecting a case of fraud, people need to immediately report it to the police to quickly verify, prevent and handle violators according to regulations...