In January and February of this year, police authorities reported an exponential increase in telephone fraud, four times higher than that recorded in the same period of 2022, with 39 phone calls earning the fraudsters around 6.2 million patacas. The information was provided yesterday by Long Hon Wai, head of the Computer Crimes Investigation Division of the Judiciary Police (PJ), during the Forum Macau program on the Chinese channel of Radio Macau.
The official added that more than 40 percent of the victims of this type of crime were university students, the vast majority from Mainland China.
Asked why these students are particularly affected by phone scams, Long Hon Wai pointed to cultural and cognitive differences between university students in Macau and their Chinese counterparts. In addition, the representative of the PJ stated that perhaps the students from the Interior are more focused on their studies, without paying attention to the authorities’ alerts about fraudulent activities.
Following the growing trend since the beginning of the pandemic, online fraud led to 73 police investigations, a similar number to last year, with losses reaching 13 million patacas.
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