- TOKYO (Reuters) - Fraudsters
have tricked large sums of money out of trusting Japanese this year by
phoning and pretending to be relatives in trouble, police said on Thursday.
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- In what domestic media are calling the "Hi, it's
me" swindle, victims receive calls from fraudsters who identify themselves
only as "me" and say they are in desperate need of money to cover
anything from an uninsured traffic accident to an unexpected pregnancy.
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- Victims assume the person on the telephone must be a
close relative and often agree to transfer the money to a bank account
specified by the swindler straight away.
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- There have been 3,807 reported cases so far this year,
with victims paying out a total of almost 2.3 billion yen ($21.1 million),
according to police statistics.
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- Many of the victims were women over 40, according to
domestic newspapers.
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- Police said they were recommending that people check
the identity of people asking for money on the telephone.
-
- In a more alarming development, some telephone swindlers
now extort money by pretending they have kidnapped a victim's child, with
76 such cases in October alone.
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