AN elderly man living alone in Shenzhen has been cheated out of a total of 11.56 million yuan (US$1.73 million) by fraudsters, the city’s criminal investigation department said on its official WeChat account.

    As the 78-year-old man only reported the case to police six days after the scam, his money had already been transferred to 593 bank accounts, most of them overseas, and withdrawn by the fraudsters.

    The man, who wasn’t identified, received a phone call Aug. 20, from a so-called “courier service” saying a parcel under his name had been involved in smuggling and police would contact him.

    The man later received another phone call, which claimed to be from the Shanghai Public Security Bureau and demanded that he open all of his bank cards for online transfer so they could subject them for a security check. The man opened his cards for online transfer and informed the fraudsters of the bank card numbers and the online transfer codes, police said in its release.

    In the afternoon that day, a young woman came to the elderly man’s home with two mobile phones, one using the old man’s SIM card. The other didn’t show incoming and outgoing phone numbers, which was used to contact the fraudsters. The woman also installed Trojan virus in the old man’s computer, allowing them to control it remotely, police said.

    In the week starting Aug. 20, 63 transfers were made to the bank accounts of fraudsters, amounting to 11.56 million yuan. He realized he was being cheated only when bank employees called to tell him that his bank accounts had been abnormal over the past days.

    Despite police’s swift actions to intercept the funds, it was too late as the money had already been transferred to 593 accounts through multiple-tier transfers of 27 banks and had been withdrawn from the overseas bank outlets.

    Police have locked up the 593 accounts and are investigating the scam.

    In Shenzhen, there have been 976 fraud cases so far this year reported with fraudsters pretending to be police , procuratorate and court officers. A total of 54.78 million yuan has been involved in these scams, with elderly people being the most vulnerable. Shortly after the elderly man’s case, an elderly woman was reported to have been cheated out of 230,000 yuan in a similar scam.

    (Han Ximin)