The Police have arrested two men, aged 22 and 32, for their suspected involvement in a case of impersonation of Police officer scam.
On 3 May 2017, the Police received three separate reports from victims who had received calls from unknown persons claiming to be police officers. The victims were told that they were being investigated by the Police for money laundering and scam-related offences. The calls were then transferred to unknown persons who identified themselves to be Police officers from a foreign country.
The first 27-year-old victim was provided a link to an e-service website purportedly from a foreign law enforcement agency, http://164579.tk/index.html. The victim was then instructed to key in her internet banking credentials on the website. She also disclosed the One-Time-Password (OTP) from her Internet banking dongle to the impersonator. Subsequently, the victim discovered that her bank account was accessed illegally without her knowledge and about S$50,000 had been transferred to two unknown bank accounts.
The other two victims, aged 21 and 24, were misled by the impersonators into believing that their bank accounts were used for money laundering. They were instructed to withdraw money deposited into their accounts and hand over the cash to one of the two suspects, who was purportedly sent by the Police.
Through extensive investigative enquiries, officers from the Criminal Investigation Department established the identities of the two suspects and subsequently arrested them on 5 May 2017. Preliminary investigations revealed that the suspects are believed to be involved in at least another case in which the victim had suffered loss amounting to about S$22,000.
The two suspects will be charged in Court on 6 May 2017 for the offence of Dishonestly Receiving Stolen Property under Section 411(1) of the Penal Code, Chapter 224, which carries an imprisonment term of up to five years, or with fine, or with both.
The Police would also like to advise members of the public to take precautions when they receive unsolicited calls, especially from unknown parties:
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Ignore the calls. Scammers may use Caller ID spoofing technology to mask the actual phone number and display a different number. Calls that appear to be from a local number may not actually be made from Singapore. If you receive a suspicious call from a local number, hang up, wait five minutes, then call the number back to check the validity of the request.
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Ignore instructions to remit or transfer money. No government agency will inform you to make a payment through a telephone call, especially to a third party's bank account.
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Refrain from giving out personal information and bank details, whether on the website or to callers over the phone. Personal information and bank details such as internet bank account usernames and passwords, OTP codes from tokens, are useful to criminals.
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Call a trusted friend or talk to a relative before you act. You may be overwhelmed by emotion and err in your judgment.
If you have information related to such crime or if you are in doubt, please call the Police hotline at 1800-255-0000, or dial 999 for urgent Police assistance.
SINGAPORE POLICE FORCE
06 May 2017 @ 8:45 AM