Aug 15, 2007, 11:47 GMT
Beijing - Police in south-eastern China's Fujian province have detained 74 people accused of stealing money from Taiwanese citizens by tricking them into handing over bank details and passwords, state media said on Wednesday.
The police arrested the members of a gang led by a Taiwanese man named as Fu Hanguang in the port of Xiamen, seizing dozens of computers, mobile telephones and bank cards, the semi-official China News Service said.
The family-based gang used five offices in Xiamen to trick Taiwanese people out of at least 7 million Taiwan dollars (212,000 US dollars) through telephone calls, text messages and Internet scams, the agency quoted local police as saying.
Most of the other suspects were apparently mainland Chinese citizens.
Police in the Fujian provincial capital, Fuzhou, also deported 14 Taiwanese citizens accused of involvement in similar banking scams on Tuesday, the agency said.
In a crackdown from February to July, Fujian police handled 2,438 cases and 1,352 suspects accused of attempting to trick Taiwanese or mainland Chinese citizens into handing over money or bank details, it said.
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