ILOILO City – Several lawyers and a prosecutor in Iloilo have been victimized by online hackers and scammers.
Atty. Rhoan Hiponia, together with other lawyers, sought the help of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) and Philippine National Police (PNP) Cybercrime Division over the weekend to investigate, stop the scam, unmask and prosecute the culprits.
According to Hiponia, his Facebook account was compromised and he could not access it anymore after he replied and gave his cellphone number and email address to someone he thought was his prosecutor friend (Prosecutor Shaun Cary Akot) who asked for it through Messenger.
“There was something that needed to be addressed in one of the cases nga naka-pending sa prosecutor’s office. (The message) seemed quite believable gid because it talked about the case, and the person nga gagamit sang Facebook account asked for my number and email address. Unfortunately I gave it,” Hiponia said in an interview over DYRI RMN lloilo.
Hiponia said he found out later that the Facebook account of his prosecutor friend had been hacked, and the one who messaged him was in fact not the prosecutor.
Using Hiponia’s Facebook account, the hacker sent messages to the lawyer’s circle of friends, fellow lawyers and prosecutors asking them to lend money because he supposedly could not access his online bank account.
“The scheme is ma-send sya (the hacker) sang message sa imo through my Messenger nga mangayo kwarta because ang akon allegedly online account is not active, that’s why mahulam kuno ako sang kwarta. If mainto ya na ang victim, i-convince ya nga mapadala sa iya sang kwarta through G-Cash… If you fall for that, ti, mapadala ka sang kwarta,” the lawyer narrated.
Hiponia said one of his lawyer friends and Prosecutor Akot’s lawyer friend unfortunately fell for the hacker and transferred P49,000 and P47,000, respectively, through GCash under the name “Atty. Maria Patalinhog.”
“Si Atty. Maria Patalinhog, sya ni kuno ang bayaran ko,” Hiponia noted, adding that the hacker was speaking in Hiligaynon dialect.
“Nagapangabay gid ako sa tanan, please be vigilant kag indi niyo gid pag-entertain because apparently, this scheme is targeting lawyers,” he said.
According to Hiponia, he immediately told his wife to alert his and her Facebook friends that his Facebook account was compromised and avoid entertaining messages from his messenger account.
He also appealed to his Facebook friends to report immediately to authorities if they receive the same message.
Hiponia vowed to pursue a case once they will know who is/are behind these illegal activities./PN
