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| Virtual currency voice phishing scams are increasing. / Yonhap |
By Chyung Eun-ju
Voice phishing was used to scam 800 million won ($736,000) from a woman to buy bitcoins, according to the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) on Thursday.
The woman received a call from a person impersonating a prosecutor from the Seoul District Court saying someone had opened a bank account in her name.
The impersonator told the woman to send 800 million won to four accounts to keep the money safe until the investigation was over.
The woman sent 500 million won to three accounts opened under a third-party name and 300 million won to a virtual account through a cryptocurrency exchange.
After the money was collected, the impersonator bought 800 million won in bitcoins and then cashed them out.
"Eight hundred million won is the largest scam for one person," an FSS official said. The previous largest amount scammed was 300 million won in June.
The FSS wants measures to protect consumers from cryptocurrency voice phishing as the number of victims increases.
Cryptocurrency trades are now not recognized as financial transactions and the virtual exchange is a non-financial private company, making it difficult for the FSS to get involved.
