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28 March 2024

Asians top victims of phone scams

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By Staff

Most people who fell prey to mobile phone money scams in Abu Dhabi during the 15 months that ended in March 2010 were from South Asian countries while Emiratis were fourth in the list, a top police official has revealed.

Lt Colonel Tariq al Ghoul,  officer in charge of the wing handling telephone-based crimes at the Abu Dhabi Police Criminal Investigation Department (CID) said that while most of the victims were Pakistanis, Indians and Bangladeshis were the next in line, Sharjah-based Arabic language daily Al Khaleej reported.

Iranians and Egyptians followed Emiratis in the list of victims that contains 25 nationalities, the officer said.

Brigadier General Omair Al Muhairi, deputy director general of police operations in Abu Dhabi Police, said easy availability of SIM cards from small-time traders is one reason for the rampant misuse of mobile phone to send messages that traps gullible phone users. In many cases the sellers of these SIM cards do not follow the mandatory requirements while documenting personal details of the subscribers.

He said it was a surprise that educated people very often fall for such tricks deployed by the conmen who net the gullible by texting them about “prizes” the users have won.

No campaign against this menace can be successful without the complete cooperation of mobile phone subscribers who need to ignore messages of winning prizes and report to the police, he said.