This is a so-called ‘romance scam’, a scam that involves showing interest in the other person, building trust, and then asking for money.
In the past, after building a relationship with someone, I would ask them to lend me money, saying, “I’ll pay you back right away.” “I am a soldier, so please lend me money to return to my country,” or “Please lend me money because my goods have been seized by customs,” to evoke sympathy. But now I recommend ‘investment’. We introduce two cases of damage, a sophisticated ‘romance scam’ that takes
advantage of one’s liking for the other person and the desire to make a fortune .
Mr. Kim, a man in his 30s living in Busan, was using a dating application when he contacted a woman who said she lived in Singapore. For about two months, we continued our friendship by sharing our daily lives and talking about various things.
Then one day, this woman asked, “Are you interested in investing in coins?” and brought up a story about her successful investment experience. She said, “Her sister made money by investing,” and “The coin is scheduled to be listed on a large exchange, and it will rise at least 10 times.” The man, who was fascinated by the words, started investing on the site the woman sent him. She said, “I’m only telling you secretly, so don’t tell anyone else.” She even told the man to ‘stop talking about it.’ Men trusted women.
A man who started investing by transferring her money little by little to a먹튀검증 site sent by a woman through a ‘coin trading platform’, soon opened a negative account and invested 80 million won.
As I was about to invest 20 million won more in the site the woman sent me, I received a call from the coin trading platform saying, “An abnormal transaction has been detected.” “Are you sending coins to a woman you don’t know?” When asked, the man thought “oops” only then.
She quickly tried to withdraw money, but the company blocked her withdrawal, saying, “If you want to withdraw more than $50,000, you have to pay a 10% fee .” She later realized it was a scam and she did not pay the fee. When she confronted the woman, the woman deleted her account and disappeared.
When she re-entered the site, the account she had deposited 80 million won into was also gone. It turned out that this site was a fraudulent site that cleverly copied other coin trading sites.
Last January, a man in his 50s received a message from a Vietnamese woman on Facebook. We continued our close relationship by sharing stories about our daily lives, travel, and Vietnam.
This woman, who said she was also interested in financial investment, recommended the NFT ‘picture auction site’, which owns digital assets, to the man . She said it was a ‘picture investment’ rather than a coin investment. She only made a deposit and she sent me a captured photo saying she was seeing ‘high returns’.
She advised me to try even a small amount, and she said, “If she deposits a larger amount, she will be at a higher level and she will earn more,” and she recommended further investment. When she heard that she could make real profits and even withdraw small amounts, the man invested a whopping ‘200 million’.
After confirming a certain amount of profit, I tried to withdraw 200 million won, but the service center contacted me saying, “You have to pay a 20% commission.” If I didn’t pay the fee, withdrawals were blocked and contact with the other person was cut off. This site is currently unavailable.
■ Cash -> Coin -> Investment in fraudulent site -> Request for commission… The romance scam that two men fell into , which is more difficult to investigate than cash,
has the following ‘formula’.
Professor Ham Hye-hyun of Pukyong National University said, “Romance scams are changing from a form that stimulates sympathy to a method that encourages gambling by using personal relationships.” She warned, “It’s easier to be deceived when a well-liked person recommends an investment saying he or she has made a profit.”
An official from the Cyber Investigation Bureau of the National Police Agency also said, “As the economy becomes more difficult and there are no suitable investment sources, the number of scams recommending ‘investment’ increases.” These days, “investment scams are a combination of ‘romance scams’ that encourage investment by showing goodwill and building trust. ” “The trend is increasing,” he said. In particular, it was revealed that since the coins were flowing to an electronic wallet on a site with an unknown source, it was difficult to trace the funds, making it difficult to conduct an investigation.
A romance scam that exploits both human attraction and the desire for money. To avoid being deceived, you should not make financial transactions or investments with people you meet online.