Telephone scams are not yet a thing of the past and although they continue to use more or less the same techniques as always there are those who are still victims of these scams. It was recently known that a woman was scammed out of more than $33 million through the phone.
This 90-year-old woman whose name was not revealed lives in Hong Kong in a particularly expensive neighborhood and during the past year was contacted by telephone by a man who indicated that he was in the Chinese government and that he was currently in the middle of an investigation by Identity Theft.
The man told the old woman that her identity was being used by criminals for a money-laundering operation in mainland China and that this could have serious consequences with the justice.
The woman, frightened by the situation in which she was allegedly involved, trusted the man she was talking to on the phone and went along with him.
The man told her that despite the situation everything had been brought under control but that they still required her help. So, he told her that she should transfer money from her bank account to another, to which she does not have access to make sure. That was allegedly to prevent the alleged criminals from using his identity and that later this money would be returned to him.
Thus, for several months this woman carried out multiple banking operations transferring large sums of money. She in total she transferred almost $33 million in what could be the largest phone scam ever.
The scammer at one point came to visit her victim in person and gave her a phone to keep the communication “private.”
11 money transfers were made until a person who works on this woman’s staff began to have suspicions about the situation so he decided to notify her daughter.
After alerting the Chinese authorities, a 19-year-old young man involved in the fraud was arrested and released on bail. The investigation continues and more arrests are expected in the coming days.
