1,000 people victimized
More than 1,000 people were victimized by scammers pretending to represent Macau casinos, according to the Macau Daily Times. The internet scheme was intercepted by police in the Chinese province of Guangdong. They arrested 218 people, including 38 Cambodian nationals, who allegedly made off with RMB140 million (US$21.5 million).
The Times reported that the scammers lured their victims with promotional messages sent to cellphones, and then got them to register on supposed gaming websites. They used fraudulent customer service representatives to persuade customers to transfer money into a private account to buy virtual chips and play online games. To seal the deal, the criminals would let their marks win small amounts of money; as soon as the victims lost big, the “casino” would suspend communications.
The servers were reportedly located in Poipet near the Cambodia-Thailand border. GGRAsia reported that the investigation began in March 2015 when residents of the city of Foshan, Guangdong complained to police.
The scammers used names of real Macau casino brands including Grand Lisboa, Galaxy and Venetian Macao.
