Crime | Phone scams are back, still targeting university students

Phone scams have returned to the region and continue to target young students from the mainland studying at the University of Macau (UM), the Judiciary Police (PJ) spokesperson informed yesterday while reporting on two new cases involving students aged 18 and 19 years old.

Other scams targeting young people have also been reported; in particular, two cases involving false information posted on online social network platforms.

According to the PJ spokesperson, the modus operandi of each scam varies slightly according to the victim, but in all cases eventually involves reference to a fake police department or judiciary authority in Beijing to scam the victims out of large amounts of money.

The first reported case was of a 19-year-old student who received an initial call from a worker at a telecom company claiming that his phone number would be canceled in the next two hours due to suspicious activity from the number and suspicions of identity theft.

The alleged operator then offered to transfer the call to the police department for further details. The alleged police officer then informed the victim that he was involved in a case of receipt of illegal funds, stating that an inspection of his house had been undertaken revealing several bankcards in his name. The alleged police officer claimed that the local Public Prosecutions Office had already issued an order for his detention.

After that, the victim was invited to register on a mobile application to add personal information and data.

At a later stage, the scammer asked for money to transfer to an account and asked the victim to login to another website, where the victim would enter in his banking information such as cards, pins, and passcodes.

On May 16, after fulfilling these requirements, the student became suspicious at the lack of further communication from the people who had been contacting him. Upon checking his bank account, he realized that all the money in it – a sum of RMB7,400 – was gone.

In a different case, another student received a similar call on May 14, but this time via a recording which stated that his phone had been implicated in illegal activity and that he should call a given number to contact the police.

The student was guided to the same website as the first victim where he submitted his personal data and banking information.

The next day, he received a call, allegedly from Beijing, asking him to transfer the amount of RMB10,000 to support the investigation of his case.
After making the first payment, he received another call requesting a further RMB15,000.

Three days later and after fulfilling the requests for funds, the victim was informed by fellow university students that several of them had received the same calls, which were known to be scams. He then sought help from the PJ.

During the investigation, he checked his bank account, realizing that he had not only lost the RMB25,000 that he had transferred directly to the scammers, but also that the remaining RMB15,000 in his account had been withdrawn, making a total loss of RMB40,000.

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The PJ also reported a case involving another 19-year-old student from the University of Macau who was reportedly lured into a scam after seeing a false post on a friend’s WeChat account.

He told the police that he had known this friend for two years, although they had not been in contact.

On May 19, he read a post from the friend that stated a certain company was giving away refunds of RMB300,000 to their customers. Deciding to join the “special promotion” by the alleged company, he was informed that he would have to pay RMB3,000 in order to get a refund of RMB6,666, which he promptly accepted.

The company then sent him a QR code for him to scan in order to proceed with the payment but after such payment, he was informed that to activate the platform, he would have to pay another RMB5,000.

As he found the request unreasonable, he decided to give up the promotion and called for a refund but was informed that even for the refund he would have to pay the RMB5,000 to activate the platform. Trusting that this would grant him his money back he transferred the additional RMB5,000, only to be asked for another RMB3,000 due to difficulties with the processing of the refund.

For the third time, he transferred the requested funds before losing contact with the person and realizing that he had been scammed.

He then reported the case to the PJ with a total loss of RMB11,000.

In a separate case, a 22-year-old woman reported a scam on the same social network platform involving the acquisition of concert tickets for the upcoming concert of the South Korean girl group “Blackpink” in Macau.

According to the victim’s report, she saw one of her WeChat contacts advertising ticket sales for the concert, and she contacted them to ask for more information.

She was informed that the tickets would cost HKD1,300 each, and since she wanted two, she needed to pay HKD2,600.

The announcement stated that such tickets were special and only available for casino high rollers so after the payment was made (also using a QR code sent by the account), she would have to pick up the tickets on the concert day from the casino.
On May 18, when she wanted to ask for some additional information on the concert, she was informed that the company from which she had reserved the tickets was to close and could no longer provide the tickets.

She then reported the case to the PJ.