Man Believed in a $2 Bak Chang Promotion from Facebook & Lost $6,000 Instead

By
Lin Jiawen
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First, the scammers took our dim sum.

Now, they’re onto our bak chang.

Yup, I’m talking about scammers who’ve been trying to cheat people out of their money by uploading “advertisements” that sell food items at an attractively low price.

Previously, a woman nearly lost up to $200,000 after “placing an order” for cheap frozen dim sum.

Thankfully her husband was able to spot that something was amiss and managed to prevent any transactions from taking place.

Now, it seems like even they have a special festive holiday version of their scams.

Recently, a man named Mr Lin (Hanyu pinyin) shared his experience of being scammed with Shin Min Daily News.

However, he wasn’t as lucky as the lady who nearly got scammed after placing her dim sum order.

He had actually gotten scammed due to a cheap bak chang advertisement.

Yup, the Dragon Boat Festival isn’t just about gobbling down as many bak chang as you can now.

It’s also about making sure that you’re not getting scammed.

Scammer and Victim Spoke Completely Through WhatsApp; Latter Was Instructed to Install an Application to Purchase Bak Chang

When speaking about his experience, Mr Lin explained that he saw an advertisement on Facebook stating that there were bak changs being sold at $2 each.

Mr Lin, 43, came across the advertisement last Monday (12 June) night.

He then sent a private message to the seller on Facebook and mentioned that he wanted to order 15 bak changs.

Thereafter, the seller told him it would be more convenient for the seller to communicate through WhatsApp, so the pair moved their conversation there.

After a while, the seller sent Mr Lin a link to “place his order” and instructed him to open the link so that his mobile phone could automatically download an application used to place his order.

Mr Lin then opened the application to register for an account before placing his order.

He was even given a $10 discount voucher and was told that he could pay for the goods upon delivery.

However, the application requested that he fill in his bank details.

At that time, Mr Lin felt that filling in his bank details seemed a bit unnecessary, so he raised his concerns to the seller.

The seller then told him that he could just add his order to his shopping cart and fill in his address and contact number.

$6,000 Was Stolen From Bank Account and Phone Number Was Changed the Next Day

However, Mr Lin soon realised that something was wrong the next day.

When he went to work the next day (13 June), his colleague called his phone via WhatsApp.

However, his phone did not ring.

When he called his colleague, another phone number with the same profile photo as his original number appeared on his colleague’s phone.

Hence, he realised the scammer had changed his phone number on WhatsApp.

Apart from that, Mr Lin also received a notice from the bank saying that around $6,000 had been transferred out of his account sometime past midnight on 13 June.

Bank Account Was Locked After Scammer Tried to Access Account

After the incident, Mr Lin realised he could not log in to his bank account via iBanking.

Hence, he called the bank to figure out what was going on.

The bank staff informed him that someone had tried to log in to his iBanking account multiple times but was unsuccessful in doing so.

As a result, the bank locked his account temporarily.

It was at this moment that Mr Lin realised that he had been scammed, which prompted him to call the police immediately.

When responding to queries from Shin Min, the police confirmed that they were aware of the incident and that investigations are currently ongoing.

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Lin Jiawen
Email: [email protected]