Cybercrime is increasingly sophisticated
In early July 2026, in an exchange with Lao Dong Newspaper, Ms. Nguyen Thi Lan (character name has been changed), a worker at a garment company in Can Tho City, said that she almost became a victim of the trick of impersonating a charity fund. Her husband suffered a stroke, lost his ability to work, and two young children, the whole family only relied on her meager worker salary.
After her situation was known to many people, Ms. Lan received a call from a person claiming to be a representative of a charity fund, informing her that her family's support application had been approved with the amount of 30 million VND. However, to be disbursed, the subject asked her to transfer 500,000 VND in advance on the grounds that this was a "reception fee" and "fee for verifying beneficiary information".
Suspecting that she had to pay money to receive support, Ms. Lan refused to do so. A few minutes later, the subject continuously urged her to transfer money and then cut off contact when the purpose was not achieved.
The above story is a typical example of the reality that subjects take advantage of technology to approach people, including poor workers, in order to carry out fraudulent tricks.
One of the commonly used tricks is using social networks to post fake recruitment news, promising "light work, high salary", luring victims abroad for forced labor or forcing them to participate in online scams.
In addition, they also take advantage of marriage brokerage activities, giving and receiving adopted children, traveling, visiting relatives, and even organ and tissue transplantation activities to commit crimes.
In the first 6 months of 2026, functional forces investigated 120 human trafficking cases, prosecuted 323 defendants, and identified 146 victims. Nearly 71% of victims were women; about 76% were forced labor and nearly 20% were sexually exploited.
Recently, the Ministry of Public Security's Information Portal announced that on July 31, 2026, Cao Bang Provincial Police arrested 3 more subjects in a line using "love apps" to defraud and appropriate more than 2,300 billion VND. This is the result of a special case to fight against acts of using computer networks and telecommunications networks to appropriate property. Through inspection, functional forces discovered that many Vietnamese citizens working at "companyes" run by foreigners, showed signs of organizing fraudulent activities to appropriate property in cyberspace and brought the subjects back to Vietnam for investigation and handling according to the provisions of law.
At the launching ceremony of the "TinAI?" campaign with the message "Check before news" organized by the Department of Cyber Security and High-Tech Crime Prevention in coordination with the Digital Belief Alliance and the National Cyber Security Association on July 31, Lieutenant General Le Xuan Minh - Director of the Department of Cyber Security and High-Tech Crime Prevention (Ministry of Public Security) - emphasized: Artificial intelligence is creating a strong change in the way humans create, access and spread information. However, this technology also makes the creation of images, videos, voices and persuasive stories faster and easier, making the boundary between real and fake increasingly fragile.
In that context, protecting security in cyberspace is not only protecting information systems, data or digital infrastructure. More importantly, it is also protecting society's trust in information. Misinformation, if widely spread, can damage the reputation of individuals, businesses and agencies, organizations; cause confusion in society, affect security, order and sustainable development of the country.
Also at the launching ceremony, Mr. Nguyen Thanh Lam - General Director of Vietnam Television said that fake news is not just about deep-faked fraud, fake banking websites or calls impersonating functional agencies... More dangerous are information cut out of context, distorting policies or leaders' statements, causing the initial content to be completely misunderstood. When functional agencies speak up, false information has spread very quickly.
Therefore, the "TinAI?" campaign is expected to form a widespread companion network, with the participation of state management agencies, press agencies, technology businesses, digital platforms, social organizations, content creators and each citizen. Each subject, with its role, will contribute to building a healthy information ecosystem where truth spreads faster and trust is built on the foundation of verification.
Security identification in the digital age
Talking to Lao Dong Newspaper, Senior Colonel, Dr. Dao Trung Hieu - member of the National Cyber Security Association said: Security in the digital age is not only border and territorial security but also regime security, ruling security, cultural and ideological security, economic security, financial security, data security, environmental security, energy security, and water security.
Mentioning power outages, loss of Internet connection, data leakage and fake news can all become security risks, Dr. Dao Trung Hieu emphasized that in modern society, electricity, the Internet, data and information are no longer single utilities but have become the operating platform of the State, economy and social life.
The Internet is currently an infrastructure serving payment, banking, public administration, commerce, education, media, logistics and business operations. When connections are interrupted, many essential activities of society can also be disrupted. In sensitive times, cutting off or disrupting information flow can also create communication gaps, causing rumors and widespread panic.
In particular, when fake news, distorted content, fake videos and manipulated information are intentionally spread, they can undermine public trust, divide the community, incite extremist behavior or disrupt the decision-making process.
Data leaks are also a security risk, because personal data, financial data, medical data, state management data or data of key systems can all be used for fraud, counterfeiting, extortion, espionage, sabotage or manipulation.
From a criminological perspective, it is necessary to pay special attention to the possibility that criminals take advantage of these incidents to create "amplificated effects". Criminals can both technically attack, spread fake news, and impersonate functional agencies to defraud, and at the same time take advantage of panic psychology to appropriate property.
From the above analysis, Dr. Dao Trung Hieu believes that it is necessary to shift from the thinking of protecting each individual field to the thinking of protecting the system. Functional agencies must identify the interdependence between infrastructures, build a chain reaction scenario and clearly identify which points can cause the entire system to collapse if attacked. It is necessary to shift from an incident response model to a prevention model and strengthen resilience.
It is necessary to build a substantive inter-sectoral coordination mechanism, ensuring data sharing, early warning and clear assignment of responsibilities between the police, national defense forces, specialized management agencies, infrastructure businesses, technology businesses and local authorities.
