The Consulate-General of the People’s Republic of China in Melbourne would like to post a public alert that the telephone number 03-98220604 which is the number of the document inquiry of the Consulate-General has been misappropriated by the frauds. Please stay cautious if receiving calls from these numbers. The frauds may continue to misappropriate other phone numbers of the Consulate-General. If you receive a seeming call, please hang up immediately. The Consulate-General will not dial out by the number 03-98220604. If you have already revealed your personal information, we suggest you report to the local police immediately.
Reported frauds will often have the following patterns. Caller ID would be displayed as 03-98220604, the frauds would pretend to be one of the staffs of the Consulate-General, claiming with an automated message that the Consulate-General has an important notification awaiting for collection. The next step would ask victims to press 9 for an operator. This step often involves acquiring for victims’ names, phone numbers, passport numbers and other personal information. Then victims will be informed that their bank cards or personal information were stolen and misused and they were involved in a criminal case in China. The victims will then be questioned by the so-called Chinese Public Security Department or the so-called International Criminal Police Organization which are totally fake for further investigation. Sometimes the victims can even really see a fake warrant with their names on it by logging on a false website. Finally the victims will be informed that they can only solve this problem by transferring fund to an appointed bank account and cooperating with police investigation.
The Chinese Consulate-General in Melbourne would like to remind the public that if you have received calls or had missed calls from 03-98220604, please disregard these calls as they are scam calls NOT generated from the Consulate-General.