Online scammers rope grandfather of countryside boy into carrying out facial recognition process to pilfer elderly man’s savings. Latest racket reignites concerns in China over the twin problems of online fraud and child mobile phone addiction. — SCMP
A Chinese boy who tried to collect “free gaming skins” from a live streamer ended up losing 20,000 yuan (RM12,962 or US$2,800) to online scammers, reigniting concerns over game fraud and child mobile phone addiction in China.
The 10-year-old, who lives in the countryside of central China’s Henan province and goes by the name Xiaoyu, was tricked into transferring money from his grandfather’s bank account on May 23, according to a report by local media outlet Henan Television on June 8.
Xiaoyu said he was watching a Kuaishou livestream show by a player in the game Eggy Party, developed by NetEase Games.
The boy was told that by scanning a QR code with the WeChat app, he could collect a free gaming skin, or character appearance, which can cost more than 100 yuan (RM65).
After scanning the code, Xiaoyu received an error message saying that the WeChat account, along with all the money saved in the WeChat wallet, would be frozen unless he took measures within an hour.
He was then asked to add a person on the messaging platform QQ to get instructions about the “measures”.
Xiaoyu said the person asked him to download Tencent Meeting, the Chinese version of VooV meeting app, so that he could share his phone screen with the person for “better instructions”.
The scammers then instructed Xiaoyu to download the UnionPay app, a unified mobile payment app of China’s banking industry, and ask his grandfather to log in to check which card under his name had money.
They then asked Xiaoyu to scan a series of QR codes to “unfreeze the WeChat account”, and by scanning the codes, Xiaoyu unknowingly made three money transfers to them.
“My 20,000 yuan (RM12,962) disappeared by me just nodding my head, blinking and opening my mouth,” said Xiaoyu’s grandfather, surnamed Liu, describing the facial recognition procedures required by the app.
He added that it had taken him 10 years to save up the money.
On mainland social media the case rekindled concerns over child mobile phone addiction and game scams.
China had an estimated 191 million Internet users aged between six and 18 in 2021, 96.8% of the country’s population for the age group, according to a report jointly conducted by the China Internet Network Information Centre and the Chinese Communist Youth League.
Some 19.5% of the underage mobile users surveyed said they were psychologically dependent on the Internet very much or moderately.
An investigation carried out by the Beijing Teenagers Law Aid and Research Centre in 2021 revealed that minors were inclined to game addiction due to the games’ well-designed motivation mechanism, their vulnerability to temptation, peer pressure from classmates and parental negligence.
The Eggy Party game hit the top of the gaming app ranking list in multiple phone app stores around the first quarter of 2023.
It is popular among Chinese minors due to its simple playing methods and cute designs, according to a report by the Chinese financial media outlet Shenran.
While profiting from gaming skins was common among game developers, free and cheap skins also became one of the most used tools by scammers to trick money out of gamers.
Minors, with less experience dealing with account problems, could easily be scared by the harsh wording of scammers’ error messages and fall victim to their rackets. – South China Morning Post
