Chiang Mai: The provincial office of the Bureau of Registration Administration has warned people to be wary of a scam on a Line chat account that falsely claims to be able to issue citizenship ID cards.
The warning came as the office found that 23 people have fallen prey to the scam resulting in losses of almost half a million baht.
Yesterday, the office said it had received documentary evidence of the scam from two victims, identified only as Mr Jao and Mr Jong.
Mr Jao said he and his neighbours from tambon Mae Pong in Doi Saket district hold temporary citizenship ID cards issued to stateless people.
He said he recently came across an online advertisement that claimed to be able to secure genuine citizenship cards for a fee. He and his neighbours agreed to use the service and paid the gang their money.
A scammer he contacted had posed as the interior permanent secretary. To convince Mr Jao, the man put an image of the permanent secretary as his profile picture in the Line chat.
The victims were asked to pay over 30,000 baht each for the card-issuing service.
The scammer claimed the payment was for registering their ID card in the national database and for having a 13-digit ID number assigned, he added.
After the payment was made, the scammer sent the victims a Certified Form of Particulars of Civil Registration, purportedly as proof that their names had been added to the civil database of the Department Of Provincial Administration.
The 23 victims reportedly wired over money to the tune of 515,000 baht.
Mr Jong and Mr Jao made a record of the chat history. That, along with other documents, was passed on to Boonyarit Nipawanich, chief of the Bureau of Registration Administration Region 5.
Mr Boonyarit said their certified forms were all forged documents.
He took the victims to Doi Saket Police Station to file complaints.