More than 1,000 cases of online fraud, including many in which unsuspecting victims were cheated out of millions of yuan were handled by the courts in Chinalast year.
"In many cases, unsuspecting victims were cheated out of millions or tens of millions of yuan. The most serious case involved over 100 million yuan (USD15.3 million)," Li Ruiyi, a senior criminal judge at the Supreme People's Court (SPP) said.
Different from "traditional" phone scams, internet fraud often involves identity theft and software is employed to disguise the criminal's identities and phone numbers.
According to Li, the severity of the crimes led some companies to file for bankruptcy, while some individuals committed suicide, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.
In one case, suspects illegally appropriated the personal information of retirees online and recruited a team to contact these individuals with the news that they had "promotional sales" or had won "awards."
They fleeced more than 1.88 million yuan from over 3,000 victims across the country. Judges have been ordered to issue harsh punishment on key members of telecom fraud group.
