Hong Kong Police said on Wednesday night that they had arrested three people in relation to the false reporting of COVID-19 test results to authorities.
The force said they were referred five such cases, which were handed over to the Cyber Security and Technology Crime Bureau for investigations.
This comes after the Centre for Health Protection recently reported a sharp rise in the proportion of self-reported positive cases via rapid antigen testing (RAT) that were later found to be negative via PCR testing.
Authorities launched a platform in March for residents to report positive results of self-administered RAT by submitting a photo of the test kit with the double lines.
The center also conducts checks for a sample of these cases to check their accuracy.
The center noted that the percentage of such cases went up to 15 to 38 percent the past few days, up from 7 percent in the previous two months.
The center’s controller, Edwin Tsui, said on Tuesday it did not rule out the possibility of “false reporting or attempts at misleading authorities” by using old test results.
He pointed out this could be related to the launch of the third stage of the city’s vaccine pass on Wednesday, which requires those 12 and above who have received their second dose more than six months earlier to get at least three shots to enter venues like restaurants and cinemas.
Tsui reminded members of the public to report positive RAT results within 24 hours.
He also urged the public to get jabbed to fulfill the vaccine pass requirements.
