(binhthuan.gov.vn) Recently, criminals that commit fraud and property appropriation in cyberspace have often posted and advertised the service "retrieve scammed money" on social networking pages. Many victims were "trapped" and could not get their money back but were scammed a second time.

The trick of these scammers is to continuously create accounts, Fanpages, and Websites in cyberspace impersonating units of the Ministry of Public Security, law firms, and lawyer's offices to advertise their services, such as: "receive documents", "support to recover suspended money", "recover fraudulent money", "recover suspended money on e-commerce platforms", "recover suspended money without deposit"... with a commitment to only collect money after people have recovered their fraudulent money.

The subjects use photo and text editing software to create fake documents so that people can believe that their documents have been received and processed. The subjects claimed to own the system, with capable of scanning all data of all fraudulent platforms. When people contact them, they will ask for full personal information, bank account, amount of money and form of fraud. They will ask the victim to transfer from 02 to 05 million VND into the system (actually the subject's account) under the pretext of confirming authorization to process withdrawal documents for the victim. However, as soon as the victim transfers money, the subjects will give many different reasons such as disbursement activation fee, fee for upgrading account receiving limit, credit score upgrade fee... to request the victim transferring money again and again. After that, the subjects will cut off contact and appropriate the money.

Ms. N.T.P (residing in Ha Phong ward, Ha Long city) was gullible so she participated in online stock investing and was defrauded of 210 million VND. When she knew she had been scammed, instead of report to the police, she found another way to get her money back. Through researching pages and groups on Facebook, she found that the Facebook page "Minh Khue Law Office - Support for Recovery of Suspended Capital" has advertisements to support services to recover money scammed online. She proactively contacted and followed the instructions of the subjects and she continued to be defrauded of more than 800 million VND.

Similarly, a woman born in 1973, residing in Vy Da ward, Hue city, said that when she registered her child to take the IELTS test online, scammers used many tricks to take from her more than 90 million VND. With the desire to quickly get back the money, through Facebook she contacted and followed the instructions of the page "Law firm supporting the recovery of money that has been defrauded and suspended". The money was not recovered, this woman continued to fall into the situation of "money wasted, illness gotten" when she transferred nearly 25 million VND to the scammers' accounts.

The common characteristic of victims is that they lose their vigilance in the online environment, easily believe the promises of people they do not know and have not met, leading to being seduced, manipulated and deceived by the subjects.

In order to proactively prevent scammers, the Ministry of Public Security recommends that people, especially those who have been victims of scammers to pay attention to:

1. Regularly read and grasp information on the official websites of law enforcement agencies and media to promptly identify tricks of criminals.

2. Be vigilant, carefully check and verify information on social networking sites and do not transfer money to anyone, for any reason, if it cannot be confirmed exactly who and where the recipient is.

3. If it has been scammed, immediately report to the nearest police force; absolutely not to listen to the instructions of any impersonator who claims to be able to get the victim's money back without having to transfer the fee first./.

Hữu Tri