Romance scam | Local woman loses RMB500,000 over parcel from online lover

A 50-year-old woman, resident of Macau, has reportedly lost RMB500,000 in a scam involving an alleged virtual lover, the Judiciary Police (PJ) reported.
According to the report, the woman met a man through a social media platform and maintained contact with him over a period of some time.
The man, claiming to be in a country where a war broke out, requested the woman’s address to allegedly send her a parcel containing his valuables, including cash and jewelry.
After a few days, the woman received a call from an alleged customs official in the mainland who said they had a parcel with her name. This person told the woman that since the parcel contained numerous valuable items and foreign currency, she would have to pay taxes related to such items to clear the parcel from customs.
Believing the alleged customs official, she followed the instructions to transfer a total of RMB500,000 across 10 transactions into 10 different accounts located in the mainland.
She then waited to receive the alleged parcel.
The case was finally discovered when the woman’s daughter found out that she had made multiple transfers of a high amount of money.
She then recommended the woman file a complaint with the PJ about the scam.
The PJ also revealed three similar cases during the press conference Monday, in which three local women aged between 20 and 50 years old reportedly lost over 1 million patacas in total, by sending money to alleged boyfriends that they had met on social media platforms.