BUKIT MERTAJAM: Two engineers were cheated of a total of RM251,620 in separate scams in the Seberang Prai Tengah district recently.
In the first incident, a 41-year-old engineer of a factory in Kulim, Kedah, lodged a police report after he lost RM126,000 to a non-existent job offer scam.
Seberang Prai Tengah police chief Assistant Commissioner Tan Cheng San said the man's ordeal began when he stumbled upon an advertisement in Facebook for a part-time job doing data entry.
He said the victim had clicked on the link given and was transferred to a WhatsApp chat, where he chatted with a woman, who claimed to be from a company called MySence Digital Marketing.
He said the woman told the victim that all he needed to do was open the YouTube application, look for the name of the pages she gave him, click "like", subscribe to the said pages and screenshot the tasks given.
"The victim said he would be given RM10 for each task. He received RM50 for the first task.
"The victim was also promised a 20 per cent commission for each task but he needed to make some payments first. Between March 18 and March 22, the victim conducted a total of 10 money transfer transactions into seven separate bank accounts, amounting to RM126,000.
"However, he did not receive the promised commission," he told newsmen at the district police headquarters.
Tan said it was only then that the victim realised he had been cheated, adding that the victim then lodged a police report.
In the second incident, a 27-year-old engineer lodged a police report after he was cheated in a non-existent lucky draw scam, offering him RM326,000 in prize money.
Tan said the man's ordeal began when he received a call from someone claiming to represent a company based in Hong Kong, asking him to guess the name of a song.
He said the caller contacted the victim again on March 17 to tell him that he had won the lucky draw.
"The victim was told that in order to get the lucky draw prize, he needed to make payments to three separate accounts to process the payment. He then banked in a total of RM125,620.
"The victim realised he had been cheated when the suspect asked for another RM50,000," he said, adding that the victim then lodged a report.
Tan said investigations for both cases were ongoing under Section 420 of the Penal Code for cheating.