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[1] English-speaking con artists have targeted university students seeking summer internships, using a bogus 40-minute orientation session for one victim to make their suspicious job offers appear genuine, Hong Kong police have warned.
[2] The force issued the alert after a 19-year-old first-year university student fell for a dubious job offer last month and lost nearly HK$190,000 (US$24,230), saying scammers had prepared detailed scripts to deceive her and conducted the fraudulent recruitment process in English.
[3] The force’s Anti-Deception Coordination Centre said the student had applied for several internship positions on LinkedIn in early March. She became caught up in the scam after responding to a message from an organisation claiming to be an “employment agency”.
[4] It informed her that the research assistant and project assistant roles she had applied for were already filled and immediately recommended another part-time job that required only a laptop and allowed her to work from home. “To increase their credibility, the fraudsters communicated with the victim entirely in fluent English, introducing the so-called company’s background, business model and her duties,” the force said on its website.
[5] The scammers even arranged a 40-minute online “induction training” session for her. After the training, the victim was told to log in to a company website set up by the scammers. She was given an “internal account” and instructed to earn commissions by using her own money to “buy products”.
[6] According to police, the fraudsters initially deposited three small “commission” payments into her bank account, with the largest about HK$7,000. The student continued to follow their instructions and made multiple transactions, eventually losing nearly HK$190,000 before realising she had been scammed.
[7] This type of online employment fraud, known as “boosting sales,” involves victims being told their job is to increase a product’s popularity or sales by making online purchases with their own money. Scammers promise to reimburse them afterwards. Police said the criminals also offered small initial cash rewards to lure victims into making more transactions and larger payments.
[8] The centre urged students to be wary of job offers that promised high pay without specific requirements, immediate acceptance or work-from-home arrangements. Officers also reminded jobseekers that legitimate employers would never ask for upfront payments and to verify job offers with the company.
[9] Police encouraged the public to use the Scameter search tool, available on the CyberDefender website and app, to verify suspicious job offers. Residents can also call the 24-hour anti-scam helpline at 18222 for help. Police handled 4,095 reports of online employment fraud last year, a 6.2 per cent increase from the 3,853 cases in 2024. Total losses rose by 10.4 per cent to HK$880 million, up from HK$797 million in 2024.
Source: South China Morning Post, April 6
