A Hong Kong woman has lost more than HK$1 million (US$127,636) after being lured into a fraudulent cryptocurrency scheme disguised as an artificial intelligence-powered trading app, with police reporting that over 70 similar scams had been recorded in the past week alone, resulting in total losses exceeding HK$50 million.
Details released on the police’s CyberDefender page on Tuesday showed that the victim first spotted a fake investment advertisement on Facebook, which led her to a WhatsApp chat group upon clicking an embedded link.
The group claimed to offer contacts of “cryptocurrency investment experts” and persuaded her to download a sham investment app, where she was instructed to transfer HK$80,000 to a personal cryptocurrency wallet.
Encouraged by notifications on the app showing substantial returns, she later transferred an additional HK$1 million, before realising she had been scammed.
“Investment platforms that claim to offer stable earnings, guaranteed high returns, or that ask for transfers into personal wallets are extremely likely to be scams,” the force wrote on its social media page.
Over the past week, officers received over 70 investment scam reports, with total losses exceeding HK$50 million.
The force on Monday also warned against another type of scam that begins with seemingly random messages from scammers posing as investment experts offering unsolicited advice via WhatsApp.
