Officials say a 17-year-old exchange student from China who was the victim of a cyber kidnapping was located safe on Sunday in the mountains outside Salt Lake City, Utah.
The young man, identified as Kai Zhuang, disappeared from his host home on Thursday once the cybercriminals told him his family members in his home country of China were being threatened, USA Today reported Monday.
Great Work Riverdale PD, Weber County Sheriff’s Office Search and Rescue Drone Team, Utah DPS Aero Bureau, The FBI, and Brigham City Police and Fire.
Posted by Riverdale City Utah on Monday, January 1, 2024
“His family told police they’d paid a $80,000 ransom after Zhuang sent them a photo indicated he was being held against his will,” the outlet said.
Authorities found the young man alone in a canyon near the city where he had apparently set up a tent in temperatures that were recorded to be below freezing.
In a social media post Monday, Riverdale City Utah detailed the moments when the teenager was found:
Riverdale Police Detective Sergeant Engstrom hiked on foot up the mountainside and came across the victim’s tent in a wooded area. Sergeant Engstrom contacted the victim inside the tent and found he was alive but very cold and scared. The victim was relieved to see the police. The victim had no heat source inside the tent, only a heat blanket, a sleeping bag, limited food and water and several phones that were presumed to be used to carry out the cyber kidnapping. The Brigham City Fire Department responded to the scene and checked the victim for hypothermia and cleared him of any major medical concerns.
Officials are saying it seems someone tricked Zhuang into running away from his host’s home in order to get his family to pay the large sum for ransom.
“Cyber kidnappers have been targeting foreign exchange students, in particular, Chinese foreign exchange students,” Riverdale City Utah’s post noted. “They tell the victims to isolate themselves and they monitor them through FaceTime calls and or Skype.”
The cyber kidnappers often target people who are in a new place and environment where they may be unfamiliar with the culture and law enforcement, a cyber security expert explained during an interview with KUTV:
Meanwhile, law enforcement expert Chris Bertrum told KSL News he was shocked how the kidnappers tricked the teenager and his family without ever seeing them in real life.
“They isolate the victim, they isolate maybe the target family or the target, and they put them in a position where they both are believing that something is going on that now causes them to maybe pay out money. Both groups are very fearful for what’s going on,” he stated:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y1nLDxSS1pk
Authorities are now working to locate the kidnappers involved in the case.
“Police in a different Utah city said they had found Zhuang with camping gear on Dec. 20, got concerned because the weather was cold, and took him back to his host family. He didn’t tell them he was already being controlled by the cyberkidnappers, police said,” the USA Today report noted.