Japanese man falls for phone scam 61 times

10 Aug 2007, ST

TOKYO - A JAPANESE man was swindled out of a fortune after being duped 61 times by conmen who told him his name was circulating among shady moneylenders, police said yesterday.

The 54-year-old company worker first received a phone call in early June from a purported financial company, asking him: 'Haven't you been receiving lots of offers of loans lately?'

The caller said that this was because his personal data had been leaked to moneylenders.

'We will erase your data, which will cost 5,000 yen (S$64). Please send us 30,000 yen as we'll refund you 25,000 yen later,' the caller said, according to Tokyo police.

The victim fell for this scam 61 times.

He sent 37.75 million yen in total to a designated bank account 'as he kept receiving calls saying his data could not be deleted smoothly', a police spokesman said.

He finally grew suspicious when a conman failed to meet him to pay back the money.

The culprits have not yet been caught.

There were 1,278 phone scam cases from January to July in Tokyo alone, with 2.5 billion yen defrauded, reported public broadcaster NHK.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

Identity theft hits MySpace

06 August 2007, New Paper

THAT'S ME, BUT I'M NOT SEX-CRAZY

IN the real world, Cathy Wilson (not her real name) is a sensible 25-year-old working two jobs to save for a deposit on a flat.

IN the real world, Cathy Wilson (not her real name) is a sensible 25-year-old working two jobs to save for a deposit on a flat.

But check out the MySpace website, and there seems to be another side to the Australian marketing manager and child-care worker, reported the Sydney Morning Herald.

There are sexy pictures, and on the site, Ms Wilson says she is a bisexual interested in 'sex, sex on contiki, sex at work, sex at my mum's house...'.

Her personal details, address and contact numbers are given.

But the profile isn't Ms Wilson's, although the contact details are.

She is the victim of identity theft.

Last Sunday, eager young men started phoning, e-mailing, texting and turning up at her front door.

Ms Wilson said: 'This can happen really easily. Once you put any information on the Internet, it's not safe. When I first saw the website on Sunday morning, I was distressed. I couldn't believe this could happen.'

Ms Wilson immediately contacted MySpace and the police. She has since changed her handphone number.

She believes the page was created by a former boyfriend.

She said the suggestive, tongue-in-cheek photos were copied from an Internet gallery reserved for close friends, which required a password to enter.

STALKING

Internet identity theft is an alarming new brand of stalking, harassment and defamation.

MySpace has 3.8 million profiles in Australia, and it is impossible to know how many are bogus.

MySpace spokesman Darain Faraz told the Sydney Morning Herald that even the site itself has no figure on how often identity theft occurs.

And the identity theft is not confined to MySpace.

Facebook, which bills itself as a 'social utility that connects you with the people around you' has also fallen prey to bogus identities.

The basic problem is the popularity of such sites.

Last year, Associated Press reported police were investigating whether up to seven girls aged 12 to 16 had been sexually assaulted by men they met on MySpace.

In May, a Melbourne 21-year-old, Tanya Maree Quattrocchi, was ordered to serve 150 hours of community service after stalking and blackmailing American Idol star Diana DeGarmo.

Quattrocchi bombarded DeGarmo with calls and text messages before hacking into her MySpace page and pretended to be her in e-mails she sent to the singer's family and friends.