POLICE have issued a fresh warning to members of the Chinese community living in South Australia about a scam which is deliberately targeting them.
In March, after two reports involving students living in South Australia and similar scam activity interstate, SA Police issued a media alert plus a warning in Mandarin which was distributed among the Chinese community.
At the time recipients reported unsolicited phone calls from someone claiming to represent the Shanghai police.
Police have now received a similar report, but this time it involved someone claiming to be with the Chinese embassy in Canberra and threatening the victim with deportation.
In three cases in South Australia the victims have paid money to the scammers amounting to a total of more than $350,000.
Similar scams both via social media and phone calls have been reported to police interstate.
Contact is generally being made using a “spoofed” phone number – a number appearing on a caller display that is not an accurate reflection of the source of the call.
In these cases the communication source is disguised so that recipients are misled to believe it is from a Chinese Government agency or is a China-based phone number.
SA Police has been in contact with groups within the Chinese community to warn them of the scam.
Visit the Australian Cybercrime Online Reporting Network (ACORN) at www.acorn.gov.au to report scams.
