Woman, 63, loses RM3.9 mln in love scam

Penang Police chief Datuk Mohd Shuhaily Mohd Zain said the 63-year-old woman became a victim of a love scam after getting to know the man through Instagram last December before continuing to communicate with him on WhatsApp.

"Besides falling for his promises to take care of her, the victim was also influenced by an offer to invest in an oil rig business by the suspect, who also claimed that he worked in a foreign oil rig.

"To convince her, the man would frequently send her photos and videos of him purportedly driving to work or while at work in an oil rig," he told a press conference today.

He said the suspect then asked for a sum of money from the woman on the pretext of carrying out business involving the oil rig project that would yield lucrative returns.

Mohd Shuhaily said the man also asked her to transfer the money to him in stages to avoid being flagged by the banks, adding that the syndicate used 19 local bank accounts for the transactions.

He said the woman had made 184 transactions involving between RM9,000 and RM50,000 from last December until this month and she only realised she had been cheated after she found that the pictures sent by the suspect had been edited from someone else's photos.

"The victim then lodged a police report on March 17 at the Northeast District Police Headquarters and the case is being investigate under Section 420 of the Penal Code," he said, adding that the unemployed woman had used the money left by her late husband to give to the suspect.

He advised the public not to easily trust individuals met through social media and not to transfer money to those they have just met.