The Consumer Affairs Agency has issued a warning about a surge in automated telephone scams from overseas numbers claiming to be telecommunications company NTT demanding ¡°unpaid fees.¡±
Victims have been misled into making substantial payments.
Around 6,000 complaints were filed with consumer centers nationwide between April 2022 and February 2024. Half of these complaints were recorded since July last year, when the scam intensified.
While many people hung up on receiving the suspicious calls, there are those who still fall for them. The Consumer Affairs Agency said the average loss per victim was ?2.37 million ($14,700), with one man in his 60s losing over ?40 million.
Scammers are known to use North American phone numbers starting with ¡°+1¡± and IP phone numbers starting with ¡°050.¡±
The calls typically begin with an automated message claiming to be from NTT, stating there are unpaid fees and instructing recipients to press ¡°1.¡±
Once this is done, the scammer will claim that the recipient had unpaid fees on purported membership sites for an existing business, such as ?100 store Seria or job-hunting site Vanilla, and threaten legal action for nonpayment or promise a 95% refund under a supposed compensation scheme.
Investigations by the Consumer Affairs Agency revealed that these fraudulent operators typically use deceit and intimidation to incite a sense of urgency among the recipients of the calls. The agency is urging people to exercise caution and keep a level head.
Unfamiliar payment requests, even when major companies are named, should be ignored, the agency said.
NTT and NTT Finance specifically do not request unpaid fees for individual membership sites via phone calls.
Scams using overseas numbers are prevalent, and responding to suspicious calls or returning them can lead to significant financial losses, the agency said.
It also warned against divulging prepaid card numbers to unknown parties as doing so effectively allows them to claim their value.
¡°If something feels off, it is best to hang up and consult with a trusted individual or official consumer hotlines before taking any action,¡± it said.
The agency will also disseminate this information to prefectures and municipalities to promote public awareness of such scams.
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