1Authorities in China’s Hubei Province have revealed a series of sophisticated scam tactics after launching a public anti-fraud campaign, highlighting how quick thinking helped several victims avoid losing thousands of yuan to increasingly convincing fraud schemes.
The cases were selected from submissions to the “I Have Something to Say About Fraud” campaign, jointly organised by the Hubei Provincial Public Security Department and local media. The latest batch features scams involving remote phone hacking, fake tourism tax refunds, credit score fraud and bogus online shopping claims.
One of the most alarming cases involved Mr Huang, whose smartphone was secretly taken over after he downloaded a phone cleaning app from a browser advertisement instead of an official app store.
Believing the app was harmless, he granted it accessibility permissions during installation. Unknown to him, the permission allowed scammers to install malware that remotely controlled his phone while he was asleep. Without needing passwords or verification codes, the fraudsters carried out multiple bank transfers in the background without triggering any warning notifications.
Fortunately, Mr Huang’s wife noticed the phone lighting up repeatedly in the middle of the night and discovered that nearly 60,000 yuan (about RM35,000) had been transferred out of their account. The couple reported the incident within an hour, allowing police to freeze the transactions and recover the entire amount. Officers later told them that another hour’s delay could have made the money impossible to recover.
Another shortlisted case involved Mr Wu, who received a call from someone claiming to represent China’s tourism authority. The caller accurately quoted details of a purchase Mr Wu had made at a tourist attraction a year earlier, including the date, shop, purchase amount and his personal information, making the scam appear highly convincing.
The fraudster claimed Mr Wu was entitled to a full tax refund on imported goods, along with a 3,200-yuan (about RM1,900) government subsidy, but insisted the claim had to be processed through a private WeChat account. The scammers later sent forged official documents and fake government website links before asking him to provide his full bank card details and activate screen sharing to “verify” his account balance.
Moments before authorising access, Mr Wu remembered anti-scam advice from a community police awareness campaign. Instead of proceeding, he verified the claim through the official tourism website, the national tax hotline and the police anti-fraud hotline. All three agencies confirmed that no such refund scheme existed. The scammers continued pressuring him with fake notices and a two-hour deadline, but Mr Wu blocked them in time, protecting the 80,000 yuan (about RM47,000) in his bank account.
The remaining shortlisted cases involved scammers impersonating China’s credit reporting authorities, overseas customer service representatives and online marketplace staff. Victims were tricked into downloading unfamiliar apps, enabling screen sharing or paying fake security deposits. In each case, the intended victims verified the claims through official channels before any money was lost.
Police warned that fraudsters are constantly refining their tactics and urged the public to download apps only from official app stores, avoid granting high-risk permissions such as accessibility services or screen sharing unless absolutely necessary, and regularly check their devices for suspicious applications.
Authorities also reminded the public that any request involving bank details, remote phone access or urgent financial transfers should always be verified directly through official organisations before taking action.
