Scam involving gold bars, cash sees Ontario victim lose $320,000

A scam involving cash and hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of gold bars saw an Ontario senior lose $320,000, police say.

Ontario Provincial Police said that in November, a resident of the Township of Perth East, which is west of Kitchener, saw a pop-up on their computer which advised them to call a number due to a security breach.

“The person on the other end claimed to work for Microsoft and remote access was granted to the victim’s computer,” OPP said.

“The victim was told that their finances had been compromised.”

They were told to withdraw $80,000 in cash and to buy more than $240,000 worth of gold bars from an online company, police said.

The gold was then delivered to the victim’s home by a delivery company, police said.

Then on five separate occasions over the next two weeks, unknown individuals went to the victim’s home to pick up the cash and gold, OPP said.

“The victim handed over the cash and gold, believing the persons of interest were going to deposit it at the ‘Bank of Canada’ for safekeeping after the ‘security breach’ at the bank,” a police spokesperson told INsauga.com.

None of the gold or cash has been recovered, the spokesperson said.

Police said they’re looking for persons of interest, described as men between 25 to 35 years old with short, dark hair who are short in stature.

A white Lexus sedan and dark-coloured small sedans are vehicles of interest.

An investigation is ongoing.