A woman in Shirakawa City, Fukushima Prefecture, was defrauded of 18 million yen after believing a false online message from a man claiming to be a celebrity.
According to police, the woman, who is in her 50s, received a message last November via a SNS app from the man, which made her feel romantically involved, Sankei Shimbun reported.
After a few messages were exchanged, the “celebrity” reportedly said: “I am behind in my tax payments and my bank account has been frozen. Please lend me 18 million yen. I'll pay you back double the money I borrow."
The woman believed the story and sent the 18 million yen to the scammer, using cash and electronic money. She contacted police after there was no further contact from the man.
© Japan Today
16 Comments
Login to comment
owzer
Sorry, I’m gonna blame the victim this time.
Absolutely stupid.
Bret T
I hope the loss does not leave her with no money. Likely she is alone if she made this type of mistake.
WoodyLee
"" Sorry, I’m gonna blame the victim this time. ""
100% agree. Hard to believe, with all the warnings and red flags being raised some people just don't get it.
And on top of all that she never met the man either but made the transfers and let him scam her.
Mocheake
Just out of the blue, a celebrity you have never spoken to, contacts you and sends a message that makes you feel romantically involved? That must have been one helluva message! What could it have said? "Honey, come with me to the casbah but send 18 million yen to pay for plane tickets, etc, first" "Will you make my natto for me in the morning? Well, wouldn't ya know it, I'm fresh out of natto so send 18 million yen to ensure I never run out." "Darling, without you, there's no me. So, I need you to send me 18 million yen pronto." How's that saying go about a fool and her money?
GuruMick
My wife has a friend who has fallen for such scams.
One was "You have won a football lottery in Malaysia.....please send us X amount to set up the transfer to you "
I have an email from a Nigerian Prince...poor fellow....apparently his no good brother....has stolen a tonne of gold bullion....but I can help him etc ect...
wallace
When the heart hurts people, men and women are willing to throw money at it and even the very educated have become victims of scams. It is not easy emotionally and financially to recover from.
Namahage
Awful,but for context, please read "Delete This at Your Peril".
Hilarious.
Namahage
And ,if promoted in Japan,might prevent such obvious Nineties scams from reoccurring?
mountainpear
Facebook is full of these scammers! If you report them, they do nothing, so I feel it's my moral obligation to warn people in the comments section!
garypen
The promise of more money coming later in exchange for paying some money now is how most financial cons work. Greed is a powerful motivator, and will often cause the victims to ignore or overlook the obvious red flags.
kohakuebisu
With AI, deepfakes, and chatbots, this is only going to get worse.
Cephus
Woman conned out of ¥18 mil in SNS romance scam,
I just feel sorry for her, she made a very poor choice.
リッチ
Famous person
name on the account doesn’t match
its my friend my accounts are frozen
oh okay. We’ve never meet but I’ll send you 16m. Oh and I’ll get double back how nice. This is a good investment.
bye-bye money
Often people are scammed with get rich scheme and frankly when they do no sympathy at all. They know the risk. It’s a scam to good to be true investment.
blackpassenger
The naïveté of Japanese women. They re sooo gullible
Garthgoyle
Dang. How was she even able to make that much money but blindly gave it all away that easy?
Yohan
Such cases are frequently reported in the news, banks also warn about online scam all the time and I do not understand how a person can be so stupid and transfer yen 18 million to somebody she never met in her life.
How did she transfer this money and to which account? To abroad? Even if police find out who did this, I guess she will hardly see even a part of her money again.