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 on Wednesday 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 two lines.
The center also checks a sample of these cases for their accuracy.
The center noted that the percentage of cases that were later found to be negative went up to 15 to 38 percent recently, up from 7 percent in the previous two months.
The center’s controller, Edwin Tsui, said on Wednesday it did not rule out the possibility of “false reporting or attempts at misleading authorities” by using dated test results.
He pointed out this could be related to the launch of the third stage of the city’s vaccine pass on Tuesday, which requires those 12 and above who have received their second dose of a COVID-19 vaccine more than six months earlier to get at least three shots to enter venues like restaurants and cinemas.
However, those who just recovered from the virus do not need to get the third dose until six months later.
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.
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