In a wide spectrum of cybercrime and deception operations, criminals are taking advantage of young citizens in Hong Kong, police have warned. Last year, over 900 students fell victim to romance scams and “naked-chat blackmail.”
With the release of the third edition of the force’s youth crime prevention handbook on Monday, which will be sent to youth service centers and schools in 50,000 copies, the figure was brought into stark relief.
According to Commissioner of Police Raymond Siu Chak-yee, as more people turn to the internet for purposes like dating, investing, and shopping, cybercrime is becoming more widespread worldwide.
“Cybercrime affects people of all ages; they not only fall prey to those crimes but are also used [by criminals] to aid those activities,” he said.
“But [police] have fewer opportunities to come in contact with young people compared with teachers, social workers, and parents, so we need to work together to help deliver our knowledge and messages.”
A nine-year-old girl who was revealed to have been videotaped having sex with a man she met on a dating app was the youngest victim of cybercrime.
Victims of scams were also frequently implicated in situations of sexual exploitation.
The majority of victims of blackmail via nude chat were students. Of the 2,117 cases that police reported last year, 443, or one-fifth, included students.
Of the 1,402 occurrences of naked-chat blackmail in 2022, 311 cases, or 22%, included students.
One of the incidences included an 11-year-old girl who met a man on an online board game platform and was tricked into having nude conversations with him. Then he begged for more pictures of her in her underwear and threatened to post them online.
At least 450 compensated dating instances involving students were reported to the city in the previous year. The 2022 figure was not provided by the force.
In these cases, con artists pose as women in order to sell sex services. After requesting that victims purchase them cryptocurrency or gaming point cards as a deposit, they vanish.
In one of the most recent examples, a 13-year-old kid was defrauded of HK$768 after he purchased a game point card from a female he met online in exchange for dating services.
Not only are young people vulnerable to cybersex crimes, but they also run the risk of breaking the law.
1,541 individuals under the age of 21 were arrested in the first half of last year, which is twelve higher than the same period the previous year but still less than the 10-year average.
Siu credited the combined preventive efforts of police and other stakeholders for the 10–30% drop in the number of juvenile arrests for drug, criminal damage, and triad offenses.
However, there was a thirty to fifty percent increase in the number of young people imprisoned for stealing, fraud, and other offenses.
According to Siu, police were worried that deceit cases—which accounted for 288 arrests in the first half of the year, a 30% rise from 217 in the same period in 2023—remained the most common among youth.
“In many cases, they rented out, lent, or sold their bank accounts to syndicates to receive the proceeds of fraud, which means money laundering. I believe they were not aware of how serious this is,” he said.
He went on to say that young people were often employed by syndicates to collect money from victims.
“Police have applied for heavier penalties in courts for [some] scam cases, hoping to achieve a stronger deterrent effect.”
Regarding the rise in theft cases, Siu suggested that some young people were drawn to the trend by the promise of fast money and were looking for thrills.
Five categories are highlighted in the force’s recently released booklet: robbery, theft, fraud and money laundering, online sex crimes, and online deception and deepfakes.
The five were selected by the police based on patterns in recent years of minor offenders.
Every subject includes actual cases with court decisions, along with advice for educators and parents on how to spot early warning indicators and keep kids out of trouble.
The pamphlet advises parents to exercise caution in the event that their children begin to withhold information from them or get a sizable sum of money; shady activity in their bank accounts may also be cause for concern.
Frontline educators required training, according to Raymond Kong Ho-man of the Education University’s department of curriculum and instruction.
“Students are natives of the digital world, but we are just immigrants. If teachers cannot get hold of the latest trends in juvenile crime, they can hardly devise a targeted teaching strategy,” stated Kong, who was involved in the creation of a different set of bilingual teaching resources on crime prevention.
One widespread misunderstanding, according to him, that needed to be dispelled was the idea that minors would not face severe repercussions for their criminal behavior.
Also read: Unveiling the Ethical Imperatives: Navigating the Intersection of AI and Cybersecurity
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