If It Looks Like A Scam, It Will Be A Scam
It's Easy Money For Someone - But Not For You
You will have received and deleted emails requesting your personal intervention to help some poor soul recover vast amounts of money they are rightfully due. A slightly different scam with a different approach may arrive in the regular post and it will look very professional and genuine. One scam doing the rounds now is a letter containing a glossy brochure from a travel agent in Hong Kong extolling the delights of cruising holidays booked through their company. Included in the envelope will be two scratch and win tickets, one of which may reveal that a substantial cash prize is waiting to claimed.
It Is Too Easy To Be True
All one has to do is phone the company and claim the prize. Intrigued by the idea of being given a large sum of money by a company never previously heard of and with which business was never likely to be done, the phone number was called via Skype and a woman calling herself Jenny answered. She offered profuse congratulations and said that to claim the prize her company needed to be faxed some proof of identity, an image of the ticket and the number of a bank account into which the money would be deposited.
When asked about using email to supply these details Jenny said that the company didn’t use email as they got too many of them.
After checking with a local bank that nothing was able to be done if an unauthorized person knew only someone’s bank account number, just to play it safe, a stand alone account was set up and the account number and the other required information was sent to Jenny.
The Plot Thickens
The travel company that sent the brochure has a website, but could not be found in the Hong Kong telephone book. A link from the website didn’t work, so contact could not be made that way. The street address supplied was not known to Google Maps, however a building with the same name as given in the travel company’s’ address does exist. Not surprisingly, it was found to be located at an entirely different address to that supplied. No street view image was available on Google, but a satellite image shows a multi-story building that looks like it might be an accommodation tower.
Later in the day a phone call was received from a man introducing himself as Mr. Ling claiming to be calling on behalf of a hotel and casino complex in Macau. He told a long story about the hotel sponsoring the travel company’s promotion. To enable the company to make payment of the prize certain legal procedures had to be followed regarding the acquisition of American dollars, payment of tax and other fees.
The Sting
All the prize winner had to do to facilitate payment of the (US)$100, 000 into ones bank account, is to send him over (US)$5,000 to cover these expenses. Surprise!
Naturally the money was not sent and the hotel contacted by email providing details of the scam. No reply was initially received from the hotel. The hotel is, according to the photos on its web-site, a very up-market hotel and casino complex in Macau. In the on-line phone book its address appears differently to that shown on the web site. The hotels website also provides a different telephone number to that in the on-line telephone book. A Google satellite image shows a large complex in the same place as the street address shown on the web site so it appears that the hotel does exist but it probably has more than one point of contact. The hotel is likely not to be involved in the scam but it appears that the hotels name is used as a front by the fraudsters to add credibility.
The following day another phone call was received from Jenny to encourage the payment of the (US)$5,000 necessary to pay the tax. Thus far there had not been one piece of evidence provided, or even an offer made to provide any, that would prove the travel agent business exists and is legitimate. There was no mention of any government forms necessary to become a one-off taxpayer in Hong Kong or any request for information usually required by a government department. It seems the only requirement was to send (US)$5,000 to this anonymous person at the end of a telephone. According to both Jenny and Mr. Ling it was impossible to deduct tax from the prize and then pay out the nett amount. Obviously the scam is intended to persuade people to send (US)$5,000 and the likelihood of collecting a “prize” in return being zilch. No reputable organization would require the payment of a fee to collect a raffle prize and if tax had to paid then proper documentation would be sent.
That evening an email from the management of the hotel named as sponsor of the prize was received saying that there was no such promotion and that the hotel had reported the fraudsters to the Police.
Reality Check Needed
Winners of a prize in a competition never before heard of and not entered can be sure it will be a scam. It would seem unlikely that companies anywhere would be so generous in their promotions that they would offer such largesse to people so far away who were unlikely ever to be customers. Amazingly generous offers that originate from overseas locations, organisations or people that cannot easily be identified will involve a fraud of some sort. This entire effort to part one from ones money was very well presented and half convincing but a scam is scam no matter how well dressed it is.
The names of the hotel and travel company have been withheld on legal advice.
Hong Kong
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