Police alert state officials about scammers preying on them for info
The police on Monday warned government officials to carefully cross-check the identity of those seeking information from them, saying they could be used by fake call-centres to assist their scams.
Royal Thai Police deputy spokesman Pol Colonel Siriwat Deepor said the scammers could disguise themselves as public prosecutors, judges, officials of the Office of the National Anti-Corruption Commission, and other government agencies.
Siriwat said the scammers would call local administrations and certain private organisations to seek information about their targets.
The scammers would claim that they wanted personal information of certain persons to seek arrest warrants. Sometimes, they called to check the names of residents of a household or a company’s employees.
In some cases, officials of the organisations were deceived into contacting the targets for the scammers to create trust.
“But the Royal Thai Police has a protocol for checking such practices so our police officers do not fall prey to the scammers. They instead informed their superiors and we are conducting investigations to try to arrest the scammers in these cases,” Siriwat said.
Siriwat said officials of local administrations, government agencies or private firms should cross-check information of the names and positions of the callers. They should always demand proof or an official letter seeking their cooperation so that they would not be deceived.