2024-07-08 20:26:55
Chinese people living abroad are being targeted by fraudsters posing as police officers from their homeland, BTA reports. A Chinese woman living in London told the BBC how she handed over all her life savings to uniformed officers who gave her a virtual tour of a fake police station via video chat.
The fraudsters contacted accountant Helen Yang and convinced her that she was being investigated for fraud in China. They presented her with manipulated evidence incriminating her in a crime she had nothing to do with. The fake cops then threatened her with extradition and a stay in a Chinese prison. Helen Young gave them £29,000 – her entire savings as ‘guarantee’ – in a desperate bid to stay in Britain.
The British media point out that similar cases happen frequently in the Chinese diaspora – and not just in the UK.
Thus, Chinese embassies around the world have issued warnings about fraudsters posing as police officers. The US FBI has resorted to similar measures after a series of cases on American soil. For example, an elderly woman from Los Angeles handed over three million, convinced that this way she was saved from extradition.
Typically, scams begin with a relatively innocent-sounding phone call to the victim. In the case of Helen Yang, she was contacted by a man posing as a Chinese customs official who told her that a package with illegal contents in her name had been stopped at the border. She is then video-chatted by “Officer Fan” posing as a law enforcement officer from the city of Shenzhen, who shows her what looks like a fully operational police station with several uniformed officers inside. After a few conversations, the woman believes that he is indeed threatened with extradition, despite being a British citizen, for a series of crimes she did not commit. She is then manipulated into writing a confession. In order to be released on “bail”, she transfers all her savings to the fraudsters. A few weeks later, the extortionists contacted her again for a larger amount, and only then did she contact her daughter, who patiently explained that she had been the victim of a scam. In the end, Helen’s bank returned the money, but the whole story could have ended worse, the BBC reports and presents other examples of victims of fake law enforcement officers.
Thus, in certain cases, Chinese students in Australia who do not have the funds for the pseudo-police rackets have been persuaded to fake their own kidnappings in order to demand ransom from their families.
Many of these scams are believed by experts to be run by Chinese organized crime groups operating from bases in countries such as Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos.