The Hon. Member of Parliament for South Tongu and a ranking member on Youth, Sports and Culture committee, Wisdom Komla Woyome has expressed a very disgusting and serious activities of Internet fraudsters by using pictures and information of members of Parliament and other important personalities in their dubious activities.
Mr. Woyome explained that, criminals who are into Internet fraud are these days using people of high profile in society to impersonate so as to convince as many victims as they could and dupe them for which himself has been a victim of those whose pictures and information are being used to dupe innocent citizens.
He said, in few days past, he has been receiving complaints from many people who have been duped with an account on Facebook in his name, (Wisdom Komla Woyome) for which he has made an official complaint of these fraudsters to the police for action to be taken, but it’s becoming very challenging for the police to investigate to uncover persons behind these fraudulent act and therefore calling on Rt.
Hon. Speaker of Parliament, Prof. Aaron Mike Oquaye to invite the major stakeholders in the area of cyber security, Internet fraud and telecommunication companies to take swift actions to address criminal activities to protect the ordinary and vulnerable citizenry from falling victims to these criminals.
Majority leader, Osei Kyei Mensah Bonsu also had to share his experience where a lady he has no idea met him at Patase feeling station mall, near the police station in Kumasi, claiming that, she has been chatting with him on Facebook and had promised to get her job at Ghana Gas which she some monies had also been paid so as to get the job as agreed, so the lady had to travel all the way from the United States of America down to Ghana to meet the Majority leader, meanwhile, Mr Osei Kyei Mensah Bonsu had no idea about the claims of such lady after the reality came up, he therefore advised her to report the matter to the police for investigations to be carried to apprehend the criminals behind the act.
He further added that, he had to change his phone numbers on three different occasions only last year 2019, just because some criminals were able to manipulate his phone calls in doing things he has no idea and had to report to police.
Majority leader urged the ministry of communication to collaborate with the police in this matter and act proactively to deal with the issue of Internet fraud and impersonation.
The Hon. Minority leader, Haruna Iddrisu also shared his experience how some fraudsters were using his name in collection of money ranging between Gh 300 to Gh 500 Cedis to recruit people who pays such amount into any of the public institutions.
Mr. Haruna said, he has to issue five statements as Haruna Iddrisu that, he has nothing to do with advertisement relating to payment of such monies on social media.
He called on the police and the cyber security unit to arrest anyone who operates any account with his name either on Facebook, whatsapp, tweeter and others, since he do not have and had never open a social media account in his entire life and therefore any account found on social media in his name is fraud.
Also, the member of Parliament for Ningo Prampra who also is a member on communication committee in Parliament, Samuel Nartey George (Sam George) contributed to the statement explaining that, he has to officially report to facebook to shut down four fake accounts in his name which were being operated by these same fraudsters about three months ago.
Sam George further revealed that, some known and unknown people call to complain to him some assurances that has been given to them by both Majority leader Osei Kyei Mensah Bonsu and Haruna Iddrisu being the Minority leader by getting them jobs and has taken sum huge sums of monies from such citizens, meanwhile these accounts both the Majority and Minority leaders were operated by those unknown fraudsters.
He outlined some measures which the security personal could adopt in fight of these Internet fraud and therfore called on appropriate authorities to be up and doing by clamping down the activities of these Internet fraudsters especially those on Facebook.
