police say common sense can often be the best defense. >> thank you, tomomitsu. >>> sometimes tragedy can lead to hope. in 2001 a south korean student living in tokyo died while trying to help a japanese man who had fallen off a station platform. 12 years later his legacy is helping bridge the gap between the two countries even in the face of relations due to a territory dispute and conflicts of history. anna jung has more. >> reporter: it was here at this station in tokyo that he died 12 years ago. on the anniversary -- >> translator: it is a comfort for me to know that my sop is still honored here. >> translator: many people remember his action. i'm happy my son remains in people's hearts. >> reporter: the accident occurred on the evening of january 26, 2001. japanese men jumped down to rescue a drunken man who had fallen onto the tracks but all three men were hit by a train and died. ye was 26 years old. he had come to tokyo to study japanese to get a job at a trading company. his dream was to serve as a bridge between the two countries, south korea and japan. his family lives in h

earlier i spoke to nhk world's tomomitsu oto. i asked him why they keep falling for this even though they're aware of the crimes. >> criminal groups are now using more varied and sophisticated techniques. the classic case where a con artist pretends to be a family member to steal money declined last year by more than 1,000 incidents to about 3,600. police awareness campaigns have been credited. but the number of fraud cases has increased by more than 1,500. some premier groups are moving away from bank transfers because of limits on the amount of money that can be moved. an increasing number of them collect cash from victims in person aiming for a bigger payout. this is reflected in the statistics. more money is being swindled in individual cases. the amount lost increased by about $16,000 per case last year compared to 2011. that pushed up the total amount as well. >> you mentioned police awareness campaigns, authorities have been trying to stop this kind of fraud for years. what else can they do? >> well, with japanese police c