Telecom fraud crackdown successful

Judicial organs in China have seen success in the crackdown against telecom and internet fraud in the first half of this year.

Police in China cracked 101,000 telecom and internet fraud cases and arrested 92,000 suspects in that time, year-on-year growth of 73.7 percent and 78.4 percent respectively, the Ministry of Public Security said on July 28.

Fraud through fake loans, part-time jobs, investment, online gambling, as well as impersonations of customer service and law enforcement officers accounted for over 70 percent of the cases, according to the ministry.

Police nationwide also uncovered 16,000 fraud cases related to the COVID-19 epidemic and arrested 7,506 suspects. Currently, the proportion of online loan scams has dropped from 40 percent at the beginning of the year to 20 percent, said Liu Zhongyi, director of the Criminal Investigation Bureau of the ministry.

The public security organs have also strengthened technical countermeasures, intercepting about 120 million fraudulent phone calls and blocking 210,000 fraudulent domain name websites, preventing the public from losing 66.6 billion yuan ($9.5 billion), Liu said.

Efforts were made to implement early warning and dissuasive measures, and the anti-fraud warning number"96110" was opened for the public to improve the efficiency and success rate of such warnings, which have prevented 5.6 million people from being cheated.

In response to the fact that some telecom and internet fraud groups are located overseas, Liu said the public security organs will innovate using legal means of enforcement and strengthen international cooperation to arrest criminals abroad.

Nationwide, 58,101 people were prosecuted for fraud in the first half of this year, up 35 percent year-on-year. Among them, 32,463 people were prosecuted for telecom and internet fraud, up 77.1 percent, according to a statement released by the People's Supreme Procuratorate on Sunday.

In particular, the number of fraud cases accounts for 43.4 percent of the total number of crimes impeding prevention and control of the COVID-19 epidemic, it said.

Fraud schemes have rapidly shifted to the internet, and new technologies such as artificial intelligence, machine learning and big data analysis have been applied to carry out all aspects of the crime. Telecom and internet fraud have formed industrial chains and criminal interest unions, interweaving with other illegal activities, it said.

Prosecutors will emphasize the core role of electronic data in uncovering facts and step up efforts to strengthen litigation, including the examination of arrests and prosecution, and urge authorities to recover losses.