Chinese Lonely Hearts Scammed by ‘Online Lovers’
by Min H
Chinese criminals exploited lonely men, luring them to ‘invest’ in fraudulent scams.
Falling in love in the modern world can be a tricky game. The internet offers a seemingly endless pool of potential lovers, but as researches show time and time again, the current generation (often referred to as the ‘Generation Y’) is perhaps the loneliest one in recorded history. The loneliness and despair, make many eager to find their true love, an eagerness exploited by Chinese criminals as was made public earlier this week.
The Chinese criminals located their victims online and slowly developed a romantic relationship with them. The relationships, which were mostly conducted through popular Chinese app ‘WeChat’ (a Chinese hybrid of Facebook and Twitter which is China’s social app of choice), began rather innocently. The criminals portrayed themselves as successful affluent traders and persuaded their poor ‘lovers’ to send them money for them to invest towards their ‘joint future’. As soon as the victims took the bait and sent the criminals their money, their trusted lovers vanished, leaving the victims heartbroken and penniless.
Chinese authorities have called for ‘WeChat’ users to remain alert for similar scams.
