A young local woman has fallen victim to a “fake police” scam, losing 173,658 patacas, Judiciary Police (PJ) spokesman Cheong Siu Keong said during a regular press conference yesterday.
According to Cheong, the woman received a call on Thursday from someone claiming to be a “Wuhan police officer.” The caller accused her of sending numerous scam messages from her mainland-registered phone number. The caller was able to provide her name along with the number of her Mainland Travel Permit for Hong Kong and Macau Residents, which led the victim to believe the caller’s authenticity. Following the caller’s instructions, she participated in a video call and enabled screen sharing while entering her bank account number and password for a “fund review”. She was then told to wait.
Later, the victim discovered that her online bank account was no longer accessible. Upon checking, she found that all her funds had been transferred out. Realising she had been scammed, she reported the loss of 173,658 patacas to the police on Friday.
