Website promotion fraud suspects arrested
Police raid the suspects in January.
Nineteen suspects allegedly involved in a website promotion scam have been arrested, while another 13 have been released on bail, Shanghai police said on Wednesday.
At least 300 people from over 10 cities and provinces have been defrauded and lost over 20 million yuan (US$3 million) to the alleged con artists, police alleged.
Police in Jiading District started their investigation in December last year after one victim, a woman surnamed Ni, reported the fraud.
Ni, who started a website for a freight shipping business in 2017, was said to have been contacted by representatives of a Shanghai-based tech company called Haofu at the end of that year.
She signed a three-year contact and paid 90,000 yuan to Haofu, which offered to draw clicks and advertisers to her website.
In January 2018, Ni received a call from a person who claimed to be from an advertising agency in Beijing. She forwarded the person’s contact information to a manager from Haofu surnamed Tao.
Tao then offered to arrange an ad deal for Ni and charged 210,000 yuan to have seven companies advertised on her website for 10 years.
But none of the companies posted ads on her website, and Tao from Haofu started to dodge Ni. Losing patience with the company, Ni contacted police.
Police said that the person who claimed to be from the Beijing agency was actually an employee of Haofu. They further claimed that the company was merely a front for a fraud operation.
The suspects targeted people who started websites or WeChat apps, especially those related to shipping, tourism, second-hand car sales and retail business, according to police.
Haofu, which was located in an office building on Jinshajiang Road W. in Jiading District, was raided in January.
