$32 million lost in Jan-Sep to new type of business scams
SINGAPORE — At least $32 million was lost to scammers pretending to be business partners or employees in the first nine months of the year, said the police on Wednesday (27 November).
In a Facebook post, the police said they received 276 reports of such scams between January and September.
Scammers had used hacked or spoofed email accounts to pose as the victims’ business partners or employees, instructing them to transfer funds into a bank account, in what police called a “new variant” of scams.
Previously, scammers would have impersonated as CEOs, business partners or suppliers.
“Spoofed email addresses used by the scammers often include slight misspellings or replacement of letters, which may not be obvious at first glance,” cautioned the police.
The scammers may also closely mimic emails by using the same business logos, links to the company’s website, or messaging format.
They would also enclose copies of the bank book bearing the name of employees in these emails to make the requests seem authentic, the police said.
“The victims would believe that they had received a genuine email and transfer money to the new bank account. The victims would only find out that they had fallen prey to the scam when their supplier or employee informed them subsequently that they did not receive the money,” they added.
The police called on businesses to call their banks immediately to recall the funds if they have been scammed.
It also advised them to adopt preventive measures, including installing email authentication tools, firewall, anti-virus, and anti-spyware software on their computers as well as enabling two-factor authentication (2FA).
Members of the public can provide any information related to such scams by calling the police hotline at 1800-255-0000, or submit it online at www.police.gov.sg/iwitness.
To seek scam-related advice, they may call the anti-scam helpline at 1800-722-6688 or visit scamalert.sg.
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