A local woman in her 20s has been scammed out of 120,000 patacas in a ‘guess who I am’ phone scam, Judiciary Police (PJ) spokesman Leng Kam Lon said in a regular press conference on Monday.
According to Leng, the victim received a call from a local phone number on Friday, and the person on the other end spoke Mandarin with a voice similar to one of her male friends. The victim believed the scammer to be her friend, who claimed that he needed money urgently.
The victim then bought several gift cards worth a total of 32,000 patacas and sent photos of them to him. The victim then requested more money and the victim transferred 68,000 patacas and HK$20,000 to several bank accounts.
Leng pointed out that the next day the victim lost contact with the scammer and thus contacted the male friend via his phone number in her contact list, and finally discovered that she had been scammed.
Meanwhile, Leng said that the police received a report on Friday from another female victim saying that she had received an SMS from a local food delivery platform, claiming that her member points were about to expire and urging her to redeem them.
The victim then clicked on the link in the SMS and filled in her credit card information. Later, US$499 (4,000 patacas) was charged to her credit card for an unknown online game purchase. Believing that her credit card information has been stolen, she suspended her credit card immediately and reported the case to the police.
