Investment scams in Hong Kong surge 55% in first quarter involving over HK$900 million, city’s police chief says

“The number of overall deception cases has come down, but investment scams remain an issue,” he said after a passing-out parade at the Hong Kong Police College in Wong Chuk Hang.

“Scammers often entice others with high-return, low risk investment tools, but people should question whether it is high return-low risks for the scammers or victims.”

He pointed out that scammers usually lured victims by depositing a small sum of money into their accounts, to trick them into thinking it was genuine profit.

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Hong Kong Monetary Authority chief executive Eddie Yue Wai-man, who also attended the parade ceremony, said the city’s de facto central bank would step up cooperation with police through exchange of intelligence, as well as identifying suspicious transactions and mechanisms to prevent flow of illicit funds.

“We will increase public education in relation to raising awareness of frauds ... to protect citizens’ assets and Hong Kong’s financial security,” he said.

That was despite the number of telephone scams declining 20.5 per cent, love scams shrinking 28.1 per cent, online shopping contracting 6.6 per cent as well as online job and phishing more than 40 per cent lower.

Siu urged citizens to download the anti-fraud app to mitigate the risks of falling into scammers’ traps.

He said since the debut of the app in February, the average daily number of citizens’ reports on suspicious websites stood at 95 and that of suspicious telephone numbers at 434 as of mid-April.

He said the police would verify the report and expand the database of the app.

“So far we have seen a 40 per cent increase in downloads of the app, but it is still not enough,” he added.

Concerning the installation of surveillance cameras in Hong Kong, Siu said the 15 sets earlier installed in Mong Kok yielded initial impact.

He cited that the CCTV camera footage led to the swift arrests of two serious cases recently.

Siu added that the deployment of the CCTV cameras will be improved by taking into account feedback from citizens and the privacy watchdog before rolling out more in other districts.

By the middle of this year, 600 sets of CCTV cameras will be installed in crime hotspots as part of its plan to install a total of 2,000 sets by the end of this year.

He stressed that the device was for combating crimes while citing overseas experience in cities such as in London and Singapore.

“I learned from Singapore authorities that the city would install 200,000 sets of CCTV cameras by 2030 from 90,000 now,” he said. “I was told Singapore residents wanted more surveillance cameras for protection from crimes.”

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In terms of police manpower, Siu said there were more people applying for jobs with the force in the 2023-24 financial year, while assuring that there was no compromise on quality in filling the manpower shortfall.

He said the number of applicants jumped 46 per cent to 11,698 applicants in 2023-24 from a year ago. Among them, 49 per cent more people applied for inspector and 44 per cent more for police constable.

There were about 6,000 junior vacancies, he said.

“We will not compromise on quality to fill the vacancies,” he said.

He cited that only one inspector is hired out of 32 applicants while one police constable from every eight applicants.

“We will step up efforts in recruitment by going into the community,” he said, highlighting a plan to set up a recruitment booth at a shopping centre in Kwai Fong next month.