Told by a “Captain Li” that she was wanted by the Chinese police for arranging for a parcel of 36 fake credit cards to be sent to Singapore, housewife Mrs Lim (not her real name) remitted S$2.38 million to China to clear her name — only to realise later she had been duped. The sum, swindled from the woman in early May this year, is the biggest yet involving a single victim for such “China officials impersonation scams”, said the Singapore Police Force.
Scams — ranging from Internet love scams to credit-for-sex scams — have seen victims losing vast sums of money, as they become increasingly common here.
According to the mid-year crime report released by the Ministry of Home Affairs yesterday, the overall crime rate fell 2.1 per cent in the first half of the year to 16,607 cases. But the number of Internet love scam cases rose by 98.7 per cent to 298, while cheating involving e-commerce increased by 13.4 per cent to 1,145 cases.
Mrs Lim’s case is one of 175 involving the impersonation of China officials that were carried out in the first six months of this year, said the police. A whopping S$12.9 million has been lost to such scams.
When contacted by “Captain Li”, the 65-year-old was asked for personal details such as her bank account balance and email address. Shortly after, she received an emailed arrest warrant purportedly issued by the Ministry of Public Security.
Already anxious, she then received a call from a man who told her to remit S$2.38 million to China to clear her name, claiming that the monies would be “held in trust for investigations”.
Mrs Lim then transferred the amount in six tranches to four different Chinese bank accounts over a few days at a remittance agency. It was only when she called the Chinese phone numbers and found them no longer in use that she realised she had been duped.
Sharing the details of such cases in response to TODAY’s queries, the police said online purchase scams targeting buyers was the most commonly reported, with 995 cases on record this year as of June, involving a total loss of S$765,100. The second most reported were credit-for-sex scams (440 cases) which saw people duped of S$918,200; followed by Internet love scams (298 cases), involving S$11.6 million.
Among the Internet love scams, the largest sum lost by a single victim was at least S$1.2 million. In this case, the victim, Mary (not her real name), a 58-year-old executive, had embarked on an online romance after accepting a friend request from a foreign businessman known as “Peter” on Facebook in January.
According to the police, Peter told Mary he wanted to invest US$5 million in Singapore, but his money was stuck with the Malaysian authorities. To help pay the authorities to release his funds, Mary agreed to remit S$6,000 to a Malaysian account. Later in February, she was asked by Peter to pay taxes on his behalf to a man named Tom in Kuala Lumpur. But after their first meeting, where she handed over S$50,000, Tom said more money was needed. She met him on two more occasions, handing over about S$1.2 million of her savings.
It was only when Peter became uncontactable that Mary finally confided in her close friends and relatives.
Other scams flagged by the police include phony PayPal scams, impersonation of government officials, lottery scams, Microsoft phone scams, kidnap phone scams and Line impersonation scams.
In the press release on the mid-year crime figures, the police said they will continue to work closely with the National Crime Prevention Council, other law enforcement agencies, schools, parents and community partners to raise awareness of Internet-related scams.
Source: TODAY Online
