Shanghai Daily News

Con artists have begun to phone people at home to entice them into fraudulent schemes, as police have launched an intensive crackdown on such crimes committed by using cell phone short messages.

Police are warning people to be skeptical about anyone offering them a large amount of money, or valuable goods as part of a promotion or lottery, especially if the winner is told to pay tax or a delivery fee before they receive the prize.

Police wouldn't say, however, how many reports of fraud using either text messages or phone calls they have received recently.

"We haven't got detailed information about the new tricks used to commit fraud, but people should always be alert when they are offered a valuable prize," said Zhuang Liqiang of the Shanghai Public Security Bureau.

He said people are often blinded by greed when they are told they have won a large amount of cash, so they forget to ask the proper questions or take measures to protect themselves.

Earlier this month, three state agencies launched a nationwide campaign against SMS fraud schemes, as reports of such scams became more common.

The Shanghai Public Security Bureau announced last week that it received more than 5,000 reports about illegal SMS messages and a total of 1,845 Shanghai phone numbers suspected of being used in text message fraud schemes have been shut down.

As police focus on SMS fraud, locals have started to complain about receiving calls on their home phones telling them they have won prizes, but must pay cash up front to receive the money or goods.

Qiu Quanfa, a 50-year-old businessman, told reporters he received the fraudulent call at home on Thursday, claiming he won 98,000 yuan (US$12,125) from a Hong Kong-based company.

"I immediately thought of recently solved fraud cases involving prize winning information," Qiu said. "I dialed the cell phone number that the operator left me in order to confirm my suspicion."

As expected, Qiu was asked to deposit 10 percent of the sum into a bank account before he would receive his cash. He decided to inform the media of the scheme.

"I called the newspaper to remind some senior citizens or other credulous locals to be suspicious of those phone calls," Qiu said. "They usually claimed that they got your home phone number on the Internet and included it into their client list."