China cracks down on hundreds of millions of dollars of govt investment scams in 2023

Chinese authorities have launched a crackdown this year on numerous fraud cases amounting to hundreds of millions of dollars using of fabricated government documents to lure investments into fake national projects, as reported by state media on Tuesday. Public security agencies have successfully addressed over 260 cases and dismantled 180 criminal groups in 2023, related to fraudulent national projects that swindled 1.5 billion yuan ($210 million) from investors, according to the official Xinhua news agency. These fraudulent schemes are frequently conducted online and often have operations based overseas. They typically involve deceiving individuals into paying initial capital or membership fees. Commonly, fake poverty alleviation projects employ forged government documents and credentials. Online fraud remains a significant challenge in China, especially as the country seeks to attract investment funds domestically and internationally to invigorate various sectors and industries amid a slowing economy. Global asset managers setting up shop in China grapple with rampant scams where online fraudsters dupe investors with juicy returns on new products using their brands and logos illegally. Last month, Singapore sovereign wealth fund Temasek Holdings said there had been scammers fraudulently claiming to represent its Shenzhen office and soliciting money from individuals on the premise of paying them back with commissions. Chinese police this year started to crack down on online scams operating in Myanmar where more than 100,000 people engage in telecom fraud each day. Over 31,000 telecom fraud suspects were handed to China by Myanmar authorities in November. With inputs from Reuters.