Women across the world say they have lost money after a scheme involving a beauty pageant and a group which claims to be linked to the United Nations.
The scheme, uncovered by SBS, has prompted yet another warning for people to be careful who they trust online.
Brianna Roberts explains.
It's a beauty pageant bringing together women from around the world in the name of universal peace and humanity.
"I'm very proud to represent my country in Miss Universal Peace and Humanity .. / And I will represent Estonia in international beauty pageant, Miss Universal Peace and Humanity pageant... / ... Your Miss Universal Peace and Humanity Philippines!"
But one of the women who attended last year's pageant is warning it may not be what it seems.
23-year-old Rebecca Boggiano travelled to Lebanon for Miss Universal Peace and Humanity 2014.
She says things took a frightening turn when two burly men with guns met her at the airport.
"I was panicking. And I got taken to this big black Range Rover with the windows blacked out, and I was like ... 'I'm being kidnapped.' As soon as I got into the car, my heart was pounding, like, 'Who are these people?' And then, to make things even worse, they said to me, 'The organisers aren't coming anymore.'"
Ms Boggiano says they took her to a hotel in downtown Beirut, telling her they, had been duped by the organisers, who owed them money.
She locked herself in a toilet until other contestents arrived, including India's Ruhi Singh.
"I think the girls maybe were disappointed that the pageant wasn't going to happen. I know Ruhi (Singh), (who) represented India, her country takes pageants very seriously, and she was panicking, a lot, that she'd been trained for this pageant and a lot of designers and sponsors were onboard and she'd been sent with thousands of dollars of excess luggage and that nothing was actually eventuating."
Ms Boggiano says the contestants agreed to pretend Ms Singh had won the pageant to allow her to save face.
She claims they took photographs of Ms Singh in the hotel lobby wearing a sash and holding flowers.
Those websites are now on the pageant website, which lists Ms Singh as the 2014 "winner" and Ms Boggiano as the "runner-up."
Ms Singh has confirmed to SBS no pageant took place, but said she did not wish to comment further.
Ms Boggiano says she still has no idea why she was sent to Lebanon.
She says the organisers even paid for her plane tickets.
"I don't really know. But we did meet one guy who said he'd put, I think, one or two million dollars into this pageant. And he was friends with the organisers."
Months later, a 2015 pageant was announced -- to be held in Dubai in August.
Recruiting models again through Facebook, organisers promised large cash prizes and the chance to compete against women from more than 75 countries.
This time, contestents paid for their own airfares.
Some were left out of pocket when the pageant was delayed twice, then moved to the Sri Lankan capital Colombo.
The pageant is run by the so-called International Human Rights Commission.
Described on the website as world chairman of the group is Dr Mohummed Shahid Amin Khan.
His wife, Asra Khan, runs the beauty pageant and is listed as the foreign minister of the International Human Rights Commission.
David Allen worked for the Australian Federal Police for more than 30 years.
He now runs a private business helping people identify potential online scams.
SBS asked him for his opinion of the pageant and of the organisation running it.
"It's a fascinating webpage. It appears, on the surface, to be a major diplomatic organisation with lofty ideals and very much grandiose in its description of activities. But when you actually look down and drill into the organisation, it doesn't actually do anything. You start to find errors in the webpage, you find links to media releases where there's only one document from 2013. There's a series of photos of (Dr) Khan talking with mostly former politicians in places like Guinea Bissau and Lebanon. There's a selfie of Khan in the visitors gallery of the United Nations. It appears to me as though he fancies himself as some supreme world diplomat. But he has no standing, and the group is without accreditation."
The International Human Rights Commission claims on its website to have "partnership status" with the United Nations.
However, the UN says there is no such thing as partnership status, confirming in a statement to SBS:
"The International Human Rights Commission has no links to the United Nations, official or otherwise."
Questions remain as to the nature of the organisation and its reasons for running the beauty pageant.
None of the women SBS spoke with had sent any money directly to organisers.
Some did send copies of passports and other personal details.
The Australian Institute of Criminology's Russell Smith would not comment specifically on the case, but says sending passport details to anyone online is risky.
"Often, the value that the criminals are after is (identity) information, and that can be used to perpetrate an identity fraud."
SBS contacted the so-called foreign minister of the group, Asra Khan.
In a series of messages, she defended the changes to the pageant dates and location, citing what she called "security concerns" and issues with visas.
She could not explain her role at the International Human Rights Commission or provide any evidence of its human-rights work.
