On the night of 5 November, Volkswagen (China) Investment issued a statement saying that criminals had been impersonating the company and a regulatory body, sending fake recall text messages to owners and using unofficial links to extract personal information under the pretext of processing a recall.
Screenshots of the messages circulating online claimed that certain Volkswagen models had an airbag defect, demanded that owners register for a recall within a deadline, and warned that missing it would void warranty coverage and leave the owner bearing responsibility for any safety incident.
Volkswagen said the messages and the documents attached to them are not official recall notices, and told owners not to click suspicious links, reply to the messages or provide personal or vehicle information.
The detail that makes the fraud convincing is that a real recall did exist. On 4 November the State Administration for Market Regulation published a Volkswagen recall covering imported Golf and Touareg models and China-built Teramont and Audi Q3 vehicles. The stated cause is steering gear fixing bolts that can corrode and fracture. It is a different defect from the airbag fault described in the messages.
Volkswagen advised owners to verify recall information through the defect product recall technical centre’s website, samrdprc.org.cn, or through the official channels of its joint ventures.
The incident points at a structural weakness rather than a single scam. Recall campaigns in China are published centrally, follow a fixed format and produce a wave of owner anxiety, which makes them a reliable template for fraud. Owners cannot easily tell an official notice from a copy, and the penalty for ignoring a real one is a safety risk.
For automakers the practical exposure is reputational. A recall handled badly costs trust, and a recall impersonated well costs the same trust without any defect at all.
Editor’s note: This is an adapted translation of the original Gasgoo report. It has been trimmed and restructured for readability for an international business audience. The full original (in Chinese) is at https://auto.gasgoo.com/news/202611/6I70477068C109.shtml.