Chi Linh police fight against cybercrime

Cracking down on many cases

With a not-so-new trick, Le Van Phong, born in 1992 in Khanh Thinh commune, Yen Mo district (Ninh Binh) has defrauded and appropriated tens of millions of dong from many people in Chi Linh city.

Around December 2024, Phong uploaded videos of albino bulbuls online and posted them for sale on his Zalo account under the name "Farm De Choat".

When someone asks to buy, Phong quotes a price, and if they agree to buy, he will deliver the bird to their home with a commitment to a “warranty” if the bird is defective or damaged. Phong asks the person who places the order to transfer money to him first.

After receiving the money from the customer, Phong blocked communication and appropriated the money. The amount of money appropriated from each victim was not much so people did not report it, but through understanding the situation at the grassroots level, Chi Linh City Police focused on clarifying the case.

Detectives joined social media groups, focused on suspicious accounts, and discovered that Phong used similar tricks to scam many people.

When there was sufficient evidence, the investigation agency prosecuted and temporarily detained Phong for fraud and property appropriation. At the investigation agency, Phong admitted that he had no knowledge of raising or selling birds. In order to have money to spend, Phong defrauded and appropriated money from gullible people.

At the end of 2023, through the work of grasping the area, Chi Linh City Police discovered that many people were defrauded of their property by transferring money to receive gifts or fraudulently lending money.

After receiving the information, detectives from the Criminal Police Team, Chi Linh City Police, checked the social media accounts of suspect Le Thi Phuong, born in 1985, in Tho Lam commune, Tho Xuan district (Thanh Hoa) and several other subjects.

During the process of grasping the situation, the detectives found that the methods of committing crimes and concealing their crimes were very sophisticated and cunning, and the fraud methods often changed. They used social networks such as Zalo, Facebook, Telegram to commit fraud and appropriate property. The scope of activities of this group of subjects was wide, from Hai Duong, Hanoi to Tuyen Quang, Thai Nguyen...

Upon identifying the group of subjects, Chi Linh City Police established a special investigation team to clarify the criminal acts. After identifying the gathering place of the subjects, the Chi Linh City Police task force urgently searched the residence and workplace of subject Phuong.

At Phuong's house, the task force discovered 16 subjects using computers and phones to commit fraud. At the investigation agency, the subjects confessed to successfully defrauding 19 people with a total amount of 612 million VND. In May 2024, the case was transferred to the Criminal Police Department, Provincial Police to continue investigating and clarifying according to their authority...

In 2024, Chi Linh City Police handled 9 cases of law violations in cyberspace, of which 4 cases were prosecuted with 18 defendants for online fraud; 5 administrative cases of violations of the law on posting false information were handled, with a fine of 32.5 million VND.

There are many difficulties

To combat cybercrime, Chi Linh City Police advised the city's Crime Prevention Steering Committee 138 to organize two peak campaigns to combat cybercrime throughout the city; coordinate with local authorities to distribute leaflets with concise, easy-to-understand propaganda content to each household.

However, according to Lieutenant Colonel Nguyen Duc Hung, Captain of the Criminal Police Team (Chi Linh City Police), cases related to cybercrime are very complicated. Fraudsters use very sophisticated tricks and methods that change frequently, so despite being warned, many people still easily fall into the trap.

Fraudsters often do this in two ways: by convincing victims to believe and follow instructions or by threatening them by impersonating officials of state agencies or tax and electricity units to request personal information or money... In addition, many subjects create fake social network accounts in trading and business groups, make friends to scam them into transferring deposits to buy goods or make friends, entice victims to send sensitive images, then use them to blackmail...

The tricks of cyber scammers change every day, every hour, so if people are careless or lose their vigilance, they can be scammed by these scammers.

On the other hand, high-tech crime has a very wide area of ​​operation, many scammers set up servers abroad, making it very difficult to verify. Domestic scammers can be verified, but it takes a lot of time. The subjects often use "junk" accounts, addresses and phone SIMs, even registering under other people's names, making investigation and handling complicated.

Another difficulty is that coordination between functional sectors in combating this type of crime is still limited, there is no specific coordination mechanism to promptly prevent damage to victims or track down fraudsters...