A local woman in her forties and her daughter in her twenties fell victim to a “fake police” scam and were defrauded out of around 5,150 and 6,800 patacas respectively, Judiciary Police (PJ) spokesman Lou Chan Fai said at a regular press conference yesterday.
According to Lou, the woman received a call on Tuesday from a man claiming that he was from the Judiciary Police, telling her that her mainland mobile phone number had been involved in sending 1,000 “illegal Suncity gambling” messages.
The fraudster then demanded she download Skype for a video call, and the victim asked her daughter to download it for her, after which the fraudster instructed them to go to separate rooms to be “investigated” for an hour.
During the “investigation”, the victims provided their personal information and bank account details to the scammer, after which he or she required them to pay 26,000 patacas each as purported security deposits.
The police did not reveal the scammer’s gender.
The mother became suspicious and asked her daughter to leave the room to confirm the call’s veracity, but after returning to the room she said that she had been unable to do so.
The duo then reported the case to the police after they discovered that a total of around 12,000 patacas had vanished from their accounts.
Judiciary Police (PJ) spokesman Lou Chan Fai looks on during yesterday’s regular press conference at the Public Security Police (PSP) headquarters in Zape. –Photo: William Chan
