The Hong Kong police Force will launch a citywide HK$3-million ($385,600) lucky draw campaign from Oct 1, featuring prizes including flight tickets and an electric car, to promote its anti-scam mobile application as fraud cases surge.

Hong Kong Identity Card holders can download the Scameter+ app, update it to the latest version and register for the lucky draws with the app.

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Some 40,000 prizes worth over HK$3 million, including supermarket coupons, flight tickets, a smartphone and an electric car are on offer. Other prizes include a smartphone and supermarket coupons. The winners will be announced on Oct 31.

Launched in 2022 in web version, Scameter provides a platform for residents to check suspicious bank accounts, phone numbers and websites. Its mobile application was released in 2023.

The application has been linked to Fast Payment System — a major local transfer service — since November and had issued over 680,000 warnings as of July to users trying to transfer money to high-risk accounts.

The anti-scam application has covered services provided through bank counters and online banking systems from August and will be extended to auto teller machines in the first quarter of 2025.

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However, the Scameter+ app has only recorded 570,000 downloads, far below expectations.

Police officers said they hope the campaign can double the app’s users amid a surge in fraudulent cases.

Hong Kong logged 24,407 scams from January to July this year, an increase of about 12 percent over the same period last year.

Although the growth rate of scam cases from January to July was smaller than the same period in 2023 and 2022, the monetary losses from scams in the seven months jumped to HK$5.1 billion, more than 50 percent over the same period last year, according to police.

Describing the trend as “alarming”, Director of Crime and Security Keith Yip Wan-lung said the surge in phone scams is mainly to blame.

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Yip said police have noticed a new type of deception in the past few months, in which fraudsters masquerade as custom services agents and require victims to provide bank information to terminate auto-renewal payment.

Police urged more residents to use Scameter to detect scammers and prevent losses.

Contact the writer at fangxue@chinadailyhk.com