A married local woman in her sixties reported to the Judiciary Police (PJ) on Monday that she has been cheated by her “online boyfriend from Cyprus’ out of 62,700 patacas in an online dating scam, PJ spokesman Ho Chan Nam said at a press briefing on Wednesday.
According to Ho, the victim told the police that she met the male netizen on a social media app a few months ago. The man told her that he worked at sea on a marine engineering vessel in Cyprus, and they became online lovers. The victim’s online boyfriend told her that he had a lot of cash that he would send to her so that she could take care of it on his behalf. He also claimed that he would marry her in Macau after completing his contract.
Ho said that the victim received a call from an employee of a purported “courier company” early this month claiming that the cash delivery required a “customs clearance handling fee” of 6,600 euros (62,260 patacas). The victim remitted the money in two transactions to a bank account in Hong Kong provided by her “online boyfriend”. However, the “courier company” staff later called again and asked for 15,800 euros for “tax payment”. As the victim had no more cash on hand, she discussed the matter with a friend who told her that she might be the victim of an online scam. The victim then decided to report the case to the police.
