Khaberni - An exciting case was witnessed in Nagoya, Japan, after an unemployed man managed to exploit a loophole in the refund system of a food delivery app, obtaining more than 1000 free meals over two full years.
The police revealed that the suspect, named Takuya Higashimoto, 38 years old, had used at least 124 accounts with fake names and addresses since 2023 to order high-priced foods like eel boxes, burgers, and ice cream.
He always chose the option to pick up without direct contact, then reported through the app that the order did not arrive, to receive a full refund of the amount.
Authorities estimated the losses incurred by the restaurants and delivery companies to be more than 3.7 million Japanese yen, which equals about 188,000 Hong Kong dollars.
Investigations reported that the man executed more than 1095 order transactions and deleted his accounts immediately after obtaining the meals to avoid being tracked by the platform's management.
The management of the "Demai-Kan" app began noticing an increase in the number of complaints and refund requests in one area, which led them to initiate an internal investigation that ultimately discovered the recurring pattern of fraud.
The platform informed the police, who in turn tracked the suspect's activity until they managed to arrest him in July of the previous year, after a new order included meals of burgers, rice with eel, and ice cream exceeding a value of 16,000 yen.
The police clarified that Higashimoto confessed during the investigation that he started the experiment out of curiosity, but he continued the fraud after finding the method effective and easy, and he indicated that he consumed almost all the meals he obtained without paying for them.
The authorities also confirmed that the investigations proved the existence of a prior intent to commit fraud and deliberately exploit the technical flaw, and referred the case to the public prosecution for further legal proceedings on the charge of financial fraud online.
