Raise awareness of commercial transactions over the Internet

Ms. Thao (Hoa Lu) decided to book a flight to Da Nang for her whole family. Normally, she would go to the ticket booking app of Vietnam Airlines, VietJet... or through travel agencies. But this time, while surfing Facebook, she accidentally saw an advertisement for "Hunting for Cheap Flight Tickets" so she researched and booked the tickets. This agency's Fanpage has nearly 13,000 followers, posted pictures of the workplace and a good number of messages, so she trusted it. Moreover, the consultant also sent her flight information, flight times and QR codes with full information... After considering, she found that buying a flight ticket on this Fanpage was cheaper than that of other airlines, so she decided to transfer money to book the ticket.

Ms. Thao said: "I have booked many big tours online so I was quite subjective. Moreover, the seller called continuously, urging me to transfer money to hold the tickets. Because of my busy work and wanting my family to go on the scheduled trip, I transferred the money right away." However, right after transferring more than 10 million VND for tickets for the whole family, she was blocked from contacting her. All the transaction messages between the two parties were also retrieved by the seller of cheap airline tickets.

Raise awareness of online commercial transactions — Fanpage Hunting for Cheap Flights unfriended immediately after deceiving customers.

Ms. Hong (Ninh Binh city) was scammed by a sales website by transferring money first and delivering the goods later. After asking her to transfer money to a public account, Ms. Hong received a phone call informing her that she had transferred money to register as a member of the store. Ms. Hong did not agree with that form, so the sales staff asked her to continue transferring money to pay for the goods and then place an order to cancel the membership registration, then the registration fee would be refunded. Realizing that this was a form of fraud, and fearing that her bank account information would be lost, Ms. Hong quickly locked her bank accounts to avoid revealing her personal information.

It is known that currently, due to the change in people's shopping needs from going to airline ticket agents to buy tickets to booking tickets online via the Internet and social network accounts such as Facebook, Zalo, Viber..., many subjects have taken advantage of this need to carry out fraudulent tricks to appropriate property. The tricks of subjects who cheat people to buy tickets are often to create trust with complete documents, to lower the price by 100,000-200,000 VND per ticket for long flights or to advertise promotional programs with advertisements that only require a small deposit to be provided with tickets and then pay after the trip... making people trust, book tickets and transfer money for tickets, deposits, then the subjects appropriate, do not issue tickets or issue fake tickets...

Talking to Mr. Pham Van Hao, Deputy Director of Agribank Nam Ninh Binh, it was learned that there are many cases where people only realize they have been scammed after transferring money. Although the bank has recorded the customer's feedback, these are all voluntary transactions. To freeze an account, there must be a notification from the police. Moreover, after defrauding customers, these accounts are ready to cancel to erase traces. Therefore, people need to be vigilant when transacting online.

Recently, the State Bank has implemented biometric authentication when transferring money from 10 million VND or more/time and 20 million VND or more/day. The purpose of facial authentication is to ensure that the owner is actually making the transaction. The biometric authentication solution will eliminate virtual accounts, junk accounts, rented-borrowed accounts, and at the same time force scammers to use their own accounts, created by themselves. When performing biometric authentication, the police will quickly identify the identity of the violating account owner by comparing it with the information on the chip-embedded citizen identification card.

Analyzing the effectiveness of biometric solutions in preventing fraud and forgery, Mr. Pham Van Hao described that in the case where a fraudster obtains customer information to commit fraud, money cannot be transferred, the bank not only requires OTP but also requires facial authentication. Because the fraudster does not have facial authentication, it cannot be compared with the face on the bank's original records, so the money transfer order cannot be executed.

To limit risks and protect customers, the Bank has continuously promoted and posted information that "Agribank recommends that customers raise awareness and be vigilant against tricks of using fake apps to steal information and appropriate money in bank accounts".

However, Mr. Pham Van Hao recommends that everyone needs to raise their awareness in using social networks, especially in the process of conducting commercial transactions on cyberspace, to avoid cases where bad guys take advantage of appropriating property. When there is a need to book airline tickets or shop online, everyone needs to research carefully, it is best to instead of putting trust on social networks, only buy tickets through authorized agents, official websites or apps of airlines to avoid "losing money and getting sick".

In addition, each person needs to regularly monitor the media to update new forms of fraud, to avoid criminals taking advantage of and defrauding property. When detecting subjects with signs of fraud on the Internet, people need to actively denounce, coordinate with the authorities to conduct investigations, clarify and handle according to regulations.

Article and photos: Bao Yen

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