Chinese nationals use fake credit cards to steal money

Police in Hai Phong City have detained four Chinese nationals who counterfeited credit cards and used them to make bank transfers worth US$228,000 and withdrew $187,500 in cash within a 10 day period.

>> Malaysian jailed 7 years for using fake credit cards

The detainees are Lin Li Hua, 32, Xiong Jie, 34, Lin Wel, 49, and Lin JiaJun, 20, who have been charged with “using the computer and telecommunications network, the Internet and digital equipment to appropriate assets,” police said.

According to the case file, many suspicious transactions were carried out through ATMs of Vietcombank and the Le Chan branch of Vietinbank in Hai Phong from March 16 to 26, according to reports from these banks.

The total amount of bank transfers in these cases amounted to over VND6 billion ($288,000), and the amount of cash withdrawn was more than VND3.9 billion ($187,500), investigators said.

After looking into the issue, the banks and police discovered that fake international credit cards had been used.

The police launched an investigation to track down the culprits and later focused on the four Chinese nationals, who were staying at Lac Long Hotel in Hai Phong’s Hong Bang District.

Police raided their hotel rooms later, detaining them and seizing three laptops, eight mobile phones, five credit cards, and nearly VND1 billion (US$48,000) in cash.

They managed to steal credit card code numbers owned by foreigners through the internet and then created counterfeit credit cards displaying these numbers.

Police are expanding their investigation to track down others involved and to determine exactly how much money the suspects appropriated.

In related news, the Ho Chi Minh City People’s Court on April 26 sentenced Malaysian Lim Soon Ling, 55, to seven years in jail for using fake credit cards to appropriate a total of VND451 million ($21,700).

Lim stayed in Vietnam from May to July 2011 with two fake passports and 50 fake credit cards provided by another Malaysian culprit named A Tai, who is the mastermind of the scam. A Tai has not been arrested.

Lim was promised 15 percent of the money withdrawn from banks.

From May 20 to July 11, Lim made 14 transactions at local banks using ten fake credit cards and withdrew $19,000 and over VND56 million ($2,700) in cash.