Police shut down alleged love scam hub in Cebu City

Police raided and shut down an office in Cebu City allegedly being used as a love scam hub.

According to a report on "Unang Balita" by Mariz Umali on Wednesday, authorities conducted an operation following a viral post by a content creator, showing footage and recording of employees targeting foreigners in their scam.

When the raiding team arrived, they only found computers and gadgets; there were no employees in the facility.

The alleged scam hub was allegedly subleased to the manager of the operations.

Cebu City Police chief Colonel Enrico Figueroa said they have reached out to the person who allegedly subleased the area, but that she was still talking to her legal counsel.

“Aware daw po sila, and nireport daw po nila sa authority… ‘Yun ang iimbestigahan po natin, kung totoo po na nireport nila sa authority… dahil hihintayin po muna natin magbayaran bago maireport,” he said.

(They said they were aware and had reported it to the authorities… That’s what we are investigating, if it’s true that they’ve already reported to the authorities… because we still have to wait for the payments before it can be reported.)

“Love scam ang inaallege nga dito na yun ang kanilang activity, but on our investigation, sabi ng mga kapitbahay nila na nagdududa na sila umpisa palang dahil di nga daw siyang normal. Maingay daw dito sa loob,” he added.

(Love scams are the alleged activities inside, but on our investigation, neighbors said they had long been suspicious since this didn’t seem normal. There was a loud inside.)

Authorities said that a cyber warrant to investigate the abandoned gadgets is currently being processed, and that a show cause order had been sent to the building managers, as well as the alleged manager of the scam hub named in the sublease.

“Nakuha na natin yung listahan ng lahat ng empleyadong nagtratrabaho dito, kaya sila ay binibigyan namin ng pagkakataon na linisin ang kanilang mga pangalan kung sila ay walang kinalaman,” said Police Regional Office 7 Director Police Brigadier General Redrico Maranan.

(We have retrieved the list of all the employees working here, which is why we are giving them the chance to clear their names if they were not involved.)

Meanwhile, the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) had said that the incident was alarming, and that they were conducting a probe into the matter.

“I think in the video, what they caught was that they were scamming persons in South Africa. These are scam hubs. Apparently, they have a financier… That’s why I’m directly reaching out through your platforms, to these scam busters, na they can cooperate now with CICC and DICT and we can actively pursue these scam hubs and put a stop to them,” said DICT Assistant Secretary Aboy Paraiso. —Jiselle Anne Casucian/LDF, GMA Integrated News