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Monday, 1 October 2007, 10:10 GMT 11:10 UK

Fake Olympics site 'tricks users'

Counterfeit mascots from the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games on display in Beijing - 12/06/07 A Chinese man is accused of conning people out of thousands of dollars by cloning the official Beijing Olympics website and running fake prize draws.

Liao Peigui, 20, a computer engineer from Danzhou city, Hainan, made around 400,000 yuan ($53,000, £25,000) from his fake website, state media said.

He confessed to police after being arrested for fraud, Xinhua news agency reported.

The official 2008 Olympics website has proved extremely popular.

The site, www.beijing2008.cn, attracts more than one million hits per day, organisers say.

Xinhua said Mr Liao had cloned the website, which is run by the Beijing Organizing Committee, to create a similar-looking site from which he lured people into entering fake prize draws.

Victims were reportedly asked to send between 10% and 20% of the value of the prize to his bank account.

Wu Yangkang, a local security official, said some people lost as much as 10,000 yuan on the fake site.

His arrest comes after China launched a major crackdown not only on internet crimes, but also on the sale of counterfeit Olympic goods.



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Related to this story:
Beijing Olympics tickets on sale (15 Apr 07 |  Asia-Pacific )
Olympic crackdown on China's bad habits (06 Aug 07 |  Asia-Pacific )
China Olympic abuse claims probed (11 Jun 07 |  Asia-Pacific )
Games 'catalyst for China abuses' (29 Apr 07 |  Asia-Pacific )

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