A local woman was cheated out of 141,200 patacas in an online scam last week for buying gift cards so that she could meet a woman “for a meal”, Judiciary Police (PJ) spokesman Leng Kam Lon said at a press conference on Wednesday.
According to Leng, a woman in her thirties reported to the police on Tuesday that she had been cheated in an online scam last week. The victim who works in an eatery told the police that she met a woman through an app to make friends on her smartphone last Saturday.
The victim wanted to meet and have a meal with the woman who then changed to another app to continue the communication with the victim. The woman told the victim last Sunday that she needed to pay for the meeting. The victim was willing to pay and bought a gift card worth 1,200 patacas from a convenient store and forwarded the passwords and all the details to her netizen friend as payment for the expenses of the meeting and the meal, Leng said.
Afterwards, another person contacted the victim through a communication app, claiming to be the netizen’s manager, and asked for additional fees before they could meet and have a meal. Leng said the victim then bought several gift cards total worth 140,000 patacas and forwarded all the cards’ information to the manager.
The victim told the police that she contacted both her netizen friend and the “manager” on Tuesday but was unable to get a reply from them. She finally realised that she had been defrauded and reported the case to the police, according to Leng.
