Chinese Robocalls Bombarding The U.S. Are Part Of An International Phone Scam

If you live in a part of the country that has a large Chinese immigrant population, you may have recently received a robocall in Mandarin — or even several of them. The calls seem to be blanketing certain phone exchanges without regard to the national origin of the recipients. Presumably, this is how the New York Police Department ended up on the call list.

NYPD Officer Donald McCaffrey, who works in the Queens grand larceny division, is investigating the calls in New York City. He has also been receiving them on a daily basis.

"I get them also, in the NYPD building," McCaffrey says. "I have an NYPD department cellphone and I get them on the cellphones, also. It is out of control."

Non-Mandarin speakers may find the robocalls baffling — or annoying — and just hang up. But some Chinese immigrants who have followed the robocall's prompts have found themselves sucked into an international phone scam.

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