FRAUD ALERT

The use of modern communication technology by fraudsters for a variety of criminal activities has become increasingly rampart. Unfortunately, many have fallen victims of this and have suffered great economic losses which are usually in thousands of Yuan.
In view of the previous repeated cases of students being defrauded, we do hope that international students studying in China would be vigilant in order to avoid being cheated. If you are unable to handle the situation, please contact your tutor in time, do not trust strangers easily.

The following are the main ways fraudsters use communication tools to dupe people. That is through phone calls, text messages and bill absorption calls,money transfer online, financial fraud.
1.Phone Call:    

(1) Posing As an Acquaintance

Suspect may call intended victim posing as a friend and ask him/ her to guess who is on the other end of the call and after gaining the trust of the victim, the suspect would make an urgent request for money in the name of encountering an accident or family illness and would ask the victim to deposit money into their account.

Tip: Unfamiliar telephone number or another area calling code and number.

Response: Allow the caller to first identify him/herself. If you do not recognize the caller please hang up and call 110 if there is a need. 

(2) Threatening Phone Call

Intended victim would receive phone call from suspect accusing him/ her of offending others and blackmailing victim into believing that suspect is capable of harming victim’s family members or friends if payment is not done to accuser.

Tip: Unfamiliar telephone number or another area calling code and number.

Response: Firstly, victim should make sure that friend or relative is safe. After confirmation, victim should call 110 and report incident. 

(3) Posing As Public Security to Fraud

Most people have an unwarranted fear for security authority and fraudsters are aware of this and therefore would use this fear to blackmail victim. Victim may be accused of being a criminal by intentionally evading phone charges and therefore owing huge charges which is likened to economic fraud and further intimidating the victim into providing personal information.

Tip: If it’s an economic crime, another areas public security does not have the right to detain or arrest you.       

Response: Only the local police in your area can arrest you for any crime. If indeed you are guilty of any economic crime, arrest or investigation cannot be done only through telephone calls.
2.Text Fraud   

Such crimes include: receiving text messages about winning a prize or about consumption information such as you spent large sums of money. Some of the text messages may request that you pay a fee to receive your prize or you need to pay an income tax for prize winning or let you call the number in the text message for verification.

Tip: unfamiliar telephone number or another area calling code and number.

Response: Ignore the text or call 110. 
3.Bill Absorption

Victim will receive a call from suspect and once the call is picked, suspect would hang up the phone. If victim returns call, the victim would automatically lose money from his/her phone.

Tip: Unfamiliar telephone number or another area calling code and number.

Response: Do not return calls from such phone numbers.

4.Money transfer Online 

When students were shopping online, the suspect tempted you to directly pay the money into his account through WeChat or Alipay, but later refused to deliver the goods you brought, or even blacken you, and delete you from the friend list.

Tips: Shopping Online has some risky, don't trust others easily. Don't believe in pie in the sky.

Response: If you need to shopping online please use the regular shopping sites like Taobao, Jingdong etc. where it is easy to track sellers in situations of fraud. If anyone ask you to transfer money directly to them through the bank, Wechat, Alipay etc for purchasing purpose, please be on high alert for fraudsters.

5.Campus loan and usury fraud

The suspects take advantage of the lack of financial knowledge of a small number of students, exploit the loopholes in financial supervision, and induce students to consume excessively, thus causing students to fall into the trap of usury, campus loan and serial loan, and there is the risk of information being embezzled and identity being impersonated.

Tips: Don't consume excessively, and refuse campus loan and usury, be alert to unfamiliar lending platforms, especially don't easily disclose your personal information.