This group of criminals posed as local police officers, district police, tax officials, and staff from the electricity and education sectors, contacting victims to request updates on their citizen identification information, submission of online admission applications, health check-ups, and tax declarations. They then took control of the victims' phones and stole money from their bank accounts.
The Bac Ninh Provincial Police, on February 4 announced that, following directives from the Ministry of Public Security, they were continuing to collaborate with law enforcement agencies from relevant regions to investigate and expand a case of high-tech fraud in which nearly VND1 trillion was stolen from over 13,000 victims.
The Bac Ninh Police also encouraged victims to contact police for cooperation in resolving the case and urged the involved parties to surrender in exchange for leniency.
According to the Bac Ninh Police, this was a cross-border fraud operation using high-tech methods. The group operated from the Tam Thai Tu area in Bavet, Svay Rieng Province, Cambodia. They used tactics such as impersonating police, tax, electricity, and education officials to contact victims, asking them to update their personal information, submit online school enrollment forms, undergo health checkups, file taxes, and more. Afterward, they took control of the victims' phones and stole money from their bank accounts.
So far, the police have arrested nearly 60 suspects and discovered that they stole almost VND1 trillion from more than 13,000 victims nationwide, including over 300 victims from Bac Ninh, with a total loss of more than VND31 billion.
To maintain a closed loop and ensure the scam's success, the organizers divided into three groups and assigned specific tasks. One reason the scam was so effective was the carefully planned fraud scripts, designed under the guidance of a group of foreign individuals from Cambodia. Pham Thi Huyen Trang, 26, from Tien Lang District, Hai Phong, was a senior manager responsible for creating the scam scripts and training lower-level members.
Among the arrested suspects, the Bac Ninh Provincial People's Procuracy has approved the indictment of 41 individuals for "Fraudulent appropriation of property." The Bac Ninh Police continue to search for other suspects and are expanding the investigation to include crimes such as money laundering, organizing illegal migration, and helping others stay abroad illegally.
