Police in Ho Chi Minh City have cracked down on a ring that allegedly laundered money and illegally transported currency across borders.
The group allegedly used technology to hack into emails of companies engaged in economic contract negotiations, creating fake emails with addresses nearly identical to legitimate partners—differing by only one character.
They directed associates in Vietnam to establish shell companies with foreign names closely resembling partners of the victim companies, opening foreign and Vietnamese currency bank accounts to receive transferred funds.
Upon receiving funds into the foreign currency accounts, the group converted the money into Vietnamese dong and transferred it to the shell company accounts.
From there, the funds were further dispersed into various personal accounts before being withdrawn and handed over to the fraudsters.
One case involved December One Rnd Ltd, a company based in Ukraine, which was conducting transactions with Sungsan Electronics & Communications via the email address sungsan@rfzone.com.
Starting on December 6, 2023, unknown individuals began contacting December One Rnd Ltd through sungsan@rfz0ne.com and sungsan@rfzones.com to provide new banking details.
On March 8, 2024, December One Rnd Ltd transferred US$314,850 to the account specified in the fraudulent emails and informed their partner. However, the actual partner company never received the funds, as they had not changed their bank account.
On March 21, 2024, the Ukrainian Embassy in Vietnam contacted local bank VietinBank to request the freezing of the recipient account, but the bank reported that the account holder had already withdrawn all the money.
On April 2, 2024, the Ukrainian Embassy in Vietnam formally requested the Ho Chi Minh City police to investigate the case.
According to the investigation, in late 2023, Mai Tra My, who is married to a Nigerian national and currently resides in Nigeria, instructed Mai Vu Minh to establish multiple companies in Vietnam to open bank accounts for receiving foreign transfers.
Minh then converted the funds into Vietnamese dong and either handed the cash to associates or made transfers to accounts specified by My.
Minh received a two-percent commission on all received funds.
Between December 15, 2023 and March 11, 2024, Minh used three of nine companies under his name to receive a total of $789,057 from foreign businesses, including December One Rnd Ltd.
He successfully converted the funds into Vietnamese dong, which was transferred to other personal accounts under My’s instructions. Minh pocketed more than VND383 million ($14,615).
Additionally, under My’s direction, Minh transferred VND10 billion ($381,927) in cash to Cambodia to My through the Kingfood bird's nest facility in Ho Chi Minh City.
In late 2019, Le Thi Tham, then working as a factory worker in Ho Chi Minh City, met Nigerian national Okoye Christinan Ikechukwy. They developed a relationship and got married in 2020.
From 2020 to 2023, the couple lived together in various locations in Ho Chi Minh City, with Tham working in a factory and Ikechukwy working as a construction laborer.
In February 2023, after Tham was involved in a traffic accident, a Nigerian friend of Ikechukwy visited them and proposed that the couple join the money laundering network, offering a 3–7-percent commission on withdrawn funds. Tham and Ikechukwy agreed.
From January 2022 to April 2024, Tham established 53 companies, four of which received a total of nearly $1.5 million. Tham and Ikechukwy earned about VND2 billion ($76,462).
Similarly, in late 2022, while working as a food delivery driver, Nguyen Thi Thanh Thuy met a Nigerian woman named Selena. Selena hired Thuy to register businesses and open bank accounts, paying VND2 million ($7,640) per company.
Thuy established five companies and was paid VND10 million ($382).
In March 2023, Selena introduced Eneh Davidson Caleb, another Nigerian national, to Thuy. The two developed a relationship and moved in together.
Following the instructions of Selena and Caleb, from late 2022 to April 2024, Thuy established 112 companies. She received VND224 million ($8,555) for company registrations and a two-percent commission on received funds, totaling VND598.8 million ($22,857) in earnings.
By August 2023, due to concerns over owning too many companies and facilitating illicit fund transfers, Thuy stopped registering companies herself.
She then recruited Nguyen Thi Huong, who was facing financial difficulties, to register companies for VND2 million ($7,640) each.
From August 2023 to April 2024, Huong established 116 companies and was paid over VND232 million ($8,861).
Together, the companies under Thuy’s and Huong’s names received over $3 million and more than €2.9 million ($3.4 million) from foreign companies.
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