Blitz team exposes culprits behind ‘Fazza Scam’

‘Fazza Scam’ has already become a major headache to a large number of nations throughout the world, where a group of culprits from Pakistan, Turkey, Ukraine and the Philippines have been scamming hundreds and thousands of females from around the world by pretending as Sheikh Hamdan Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai. These scammers are picking up their targeted female victims from Instagram and luring them financial benefit and they are told that luck would magically change once they visit Dubai and meet the Crown Prince. For the sake of meeting Crown Prince Sheikh Hamdan Al Maktoum, scammers ask their victims to pay certain amount of fees for issuance of “Dubai Royal Membership Card”, although according to Dubai authorities, there is nothing called “Dubai Royal Membership Card”.

Scam centering the Crown Prince of Dubai

The Crown Prince of Dubai impersonation scam is one of the biggest cyber frauds in the world right now. He has 12.5 million fans on Instagram and Facebook and they are all targeted by many thousands of cyber criminals from Pakistan, Turkey, Philippines, and even from the United Arab Emirates every day, who impersonate Sheikh Hamdan by stealing his pictures and pretending to be him.

In some cases, these fraud rackets are also using DeepFake technology for producing voice and videos of the Dubai Crown Prince.

The ‘Fazza Scam’ is highly embarrassing for the Dubai Crown Prince and other members of the Dubai and UAE royal families as it has been greatly tarnishing their images and defaming their names globally. Although such notoriety can be stopped immediately once the Dubai authorities take legal measures against Facebook and Instagram for facilitating frauds in running such notorious scam ventures, but until date, no such action has been taken.

Talking to this correspondent, a cyber security expert said, “Facebook and Instagram are fully aware that no public figure like the Crown Prince of Dubai should have thousands of fake pages but they ignore this because they are making millions of dollars from selling ads on those fake profiles.

“The scams come in many forms. Usually starting with fake romance soon proclaiming ‘love’ etc. Lots of questions will be asked but very little information ever given and the Nigerian will never call you as they are aware their African voice is game over. They will upload his videos and for audio they will play one of his recorded poems but the conversation will never be live.

“The scams can range from asking you to send money for a ‘royal membership card’ to a ‘gold card’ to enable you to meet him and his family. It could be a demand for a ‘donation’ to his ‘orphanage home’ in West Africa (they refrain from using the word Nigeria because of its criminal connotations it’s always West Africa)”.

The cyber security expert further said, Dubai authorities or those victims can sue Meta, parent company of Facebook and Instagram for letting hundreds of fake profiles of the Dubai Crown Prince remain active thus allowing the scam rackets in targeting females and steal huge amount of cash.

Story of a victim who lost almost €17,000 in Fazza Scam

A victim named ‘M’ from an east European country told this correspondent:

My story is like this: on the end of last September (2022) I was contacted on LinkedIn, the professional business network by a man who pretended he was HH Sheikh Hamdan al Maktoum, the Crown Prince of Dubai and had on his profile the picture of real Prince asking to read the version of his father’s humanitarian organization called MBRGI, based in Dubai, indicating me the real site https://www.almaktouminitiatives.org/en. I studied their vision as he asked and he wanted to move our conversations on Skype application in order to chat more about this association. After we discussed more about education and helping children, he offered me to become representative ambassador for MBRGI in my country, because he said they don’ t have many locations in Europe and they are trying to develop and expand their activity. He said this position is paid with 10,000 dollars/month and granting for another important money they have to help the poor children and those ones with disabilities in every country. He said i must become registered VIP member of MBRGI in order to access that position and indicated me an email address from their administrative office, indicating a Royal code he gave me (1994) to present them and to ask them to start my registration. He insisted to make a videocall with me and he called me on skype application videocall and there was a dark image of the Real Prince, dresses in a white traditional dress and speaking for one minute or two, motivating he is not allowed by [by] his father Mohammed to call outside Dubai. But he did it to know me and to assure me it was really him. So, he sent me email address of his administrative office of MBRGI and I started to communicate with them”.

The phone numbers of WhatsApp that victim ‘M’ was communicating are +971-58-976-7118 and +971-569440616. According to our call identification software, user name of the first number +971-58-976-7118 shows as ‘Fazza’ while the second number +971-569440616 shows as Naeem Khan Dubai (most possibly a Pakistani national).

As per instructions of the fake Crown Prince of Dubai, The victim ‘M’ sent payments to the following bank account in Turkey:

Account name: Tuğba Can Çelikkol

Bank name: Ziraat Bank

Account number: 70772011-5004

IBAN number: TR 700001001777707720115004

Swift code: TCZBTR2AXXX

Branch code: 1777

Beneficiary address: Hürriyet mah Atatürk CD tutkalcı SK no 1/3 Büyükçekmece, İstanbul.

According to the national ID card number of Tuğba Can Çelikkol is A04B81965 and he was born on April 15, 1984.

Immediately after paying almost €17,000, the victim ‘M’ received another message to send donations to the following bank accounts in Dubai and Turkey:

Name: Victor Maccarthy

Bank name: Commercial Bank of Dubai

Account number: 1005858905

Bank address: Al Basha branch, Dubai

Swift code: CBDUAEAD.

Name: Aleyna Esen

Bank name: Turkiye Bankasi

Account number: 0260272

Swift code: ISBKTRISXXX

Branch code: 206

Beneficiary address: Atatürk Cd no 85 Heykel Osmangazi Bursa

Bank address: Ulu Cad. No:62, Osmangazi, Bursa, Turkey.

Talking to this correspondent, ‘Fazza Scam’ victim ‘M’ said, “I am in acute financial crisis as I did borrow lots of money from people for sending to Turkey as per instructions of the Dubai Crown Prince, which I only later realized to be false. I have tried to bring the matter to attention of Dubai Police and law enforcement agencies in my country. But until date, I did not get any response or remedy”.

She further said, “This ‘Fazza Scam’ began few years ago and it is still continuing. Scammers are targeting female mainly from Instagram. It is happening even now. Why the authorities concerned in Dubai are surprisingly silent on this matter?”

Our investigative reporters have found another gang of criminals operating from the Philippines, who also are continuing scamming various individuals under ‘Fazza Scam’. This gang in the Philippines is run by an individual named Hervé Jaubert and his wife Raquel Marquez.

Agents of ‘Fazza Scam’ gang in Romania

According to a credible source, at least thre members of ‘Fazza Scam’ racket have been identified in Romania. Here is details:

Account name: Elena Grosu

Bank name: Raiffeisen Bank

IBAN: RO83RZBR0000060023393165

Swift code: RZBRROBU.

Account name: Joao Diogo Silva Cadeirinhas

Bank name: Banco Millenium

IBAN: PT50003300004551869054805

BIC: BCOMPTPL

Bank address: Rua Aurea, 130, 3rd floor, Romania.

Bank name: Wise

Account holder: Michael Christian

Bank code: BRELROBUXXX

Account number: 0005601499320100.

Mobile numbers used by ‘Fazza Scam’ rackets

While we shall continue investigating this notorious scamming activities which is stealing millions of dollars from hundreds and thousands of females from around the world, we have so far obtained only several mobile/WhatsApp numbers of these scammers. Here are the numbers:

+971-56-381-7128 (name shows on WhatsApp is Alsa), +971-522689881 (name shows on WhatsApp is Qqqq Ammamma), +971-52237-8013, +385-95359-1999, +234-708-589-6239 (name shows on WhatsApp is In Uc. It uses Airtel Nigeria number), +234-812-895-4352 (name shows on WhatsApp is Richard G. It uses Airtel Nigeria number), +234-813-534-5767 (name shows on WhatsApp is Maryam Lawal. It uses MTN Nigeria number), +234-902-214-4504 (name shows on WhatsApp is Oyoyo Pinky. It uses Airtel Nigeria number), +63-912-967-0704 (This is a Smart mobile phone number from the Philippines), +971-55-252-1914, +971-56-760-3004 (name shows on WhatsApp is Arlyn. It uses Etisalat number), and +971-54-546-9741 (name shows on WhatsApp is Tman. It uses Etisalat number). In the following reports, we shall publish more numbers with further details.

It may be mentioned here that, dozens of female victims of this notorious scam rackets have already committed suicide, because they could not bear the tremendous shock of losing huge amount of cash after being scammed by the members of ‘Fazza Scam’.

We are calling upon law enforcement agencies in Dubai, Turkey, Romania and other countries to immediately take stern action against the members of this notorious scam racket. At the same time, we are asking victims of ‘Fazza Scam’ to contact us with specific evidences on this matter. Based on further information, we shall continue to expose those culprits behind this infamous ‘Fazza Scam’.