LONELY men looking for love have been urged to think with their heads and be on the lookout for romantic offers that seem too good to be true, as a popular Chinese sex scam hits Australian shores.

It’s already left one Canberra student red-faced and hundreds of dollars out of pocket — and he’s warning others not to be sucked in.

The credit-for-sex scam, which is common in the US and countries including China and Singapore, involves scammers convincing men to purchase cards or online shopping credits on the promise of sexual favours.

The scammers, who pose as prostitutes or students in need of money, befriend their victims through popular social media apps such as WeChat and iAround.

The victim is then requested to pay in advance by purchasing the cards, such as iTunes vouchers, and sending through images of the receipts and PIN numbers. The scammer then redeems and onsells the voucher.

WeChat, which recently reached 549 million monthly active users, has grown in popularity in Australia in recent years with the influx of Chinese-speaking students. Users can see a list of ‘nearby contacts’, making it popular with sex workers to advertise.

“They start talking to other people, claiming to be students from China, Singapore or Taiwan, and as the conversation goes on eventually they will say they really need money,” said ‘David’, a 24-year-old student at the Australian National University in Canberra.

David says he fell victim to the scam this week after being propositioned with sex by an attractive girl on WeChat who claimed to be a fellow student. “The girl said $200 for two hours, so I thought why not give it a shot? I had just finished my exam and had nothing to do,” he told news.com.au.

He arranged to meet the girl at the 7-Eleven in Braddon, but when he arrived was called by a man speaking Mandarin who claimed to be the boss. “Some Chinese guy called me and said I can’t give the girl cash, I had to go to the gas station, buy some iTunes cards, take a picture and send it to the girl,” he said.

“I really should have stopped there but I wasn’t thinking straight. I was thinking with my penis and decided to do what he said.”

After sending through $200 worth of cards, the man called again and asked for another $500 as a “safety deposit”. “I was reluctant to do that, but I was already $200 down, so I did what he said anyway,” he said.

David sent the picture to the girl, who said she was on her way, but then the Chinese man called again asking for another $500 deposit as he was a “new customer”. “I was like, ‘Dude, f*** you, I have no money left,’” David said.

“That’s when he became really aggressive, saying he was a gang member with big business in Canberra and Melbourne. He said he was going to find out where I live, that he was going to ‘pay my parents a visit’.

“He said he was going to get my picture and put up posters around where I live saying I was looking for prostitutes. He said if I had kids things were going to turn out really bad. He tried to call me five times, he left me three voice messages.”

David says he was reluctant to go to the police for fear of getting into trouble. “I didn’t think they would do anything anyway. They won’t catch the guy,” he said.

David’s story is similar to many from overseas. The Singaporean government says credit-for-sex is one of the top seven scams in the country, and has created a dedicated website to warn people.

One victim said he lost more than $2500 in the scam. “I’m not saying that I don’t deserve it, I’m just foolish enough to fall for the scam,” he wrote.

“While I hope the police can try resolve this, my hopes ain’t high.”

One Chinese student told news.com.au using social media apps to find a “xiao san” — Chinese slang for a mistress or younger woman, literally meaning “little third wheel” — was extremely common.

“It’s quite widely accepted. This is a thriving business, and where there’s a thriving business people are always going to find ways to scam,” he said. “This guy was pretty naive to fall for it, but you’d be surprised how many do.”

A spokeswoman for the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission said the consumer watchdog hadn’t received any reports of this particular scam. David believes he has the dubious honour of being the first victim in Australia.

“I hope I will be the last one,” he said.

The ACCC spokeswoman said: “The ACCC advises people to be wary of using gift cards as an alternative form of currency. Reconsider if being asked to send a gift card.

“There is a market for unwanted gift cards where criminals are able to sell gift cards they receive, so asking for a gift card is not such an innocent request as it might appear and may indicate criminal behaviour.”

In the US, the FBI issued an alert about gift card scams earlier this week. “The online presence of the secondary gift card market has grown significantly in recent years,” it said. “However, criminal activity has been identified through sites facilitating such exchanges.”

News.com.au has contact ACT Police for comment.

frank.chung@news.com.au