The Police would like to alert members of the public to a new variant of the lucky draw scam.
A victim had received a call from an unknown overseas number informing her that she had won a lucky draw. She was then asked to contact a local number through WhatsApp and told that she had won the “Singapore phone number WhatsApp lucky draw”. The victim was shown a photograph of a bank cheque with her name on it and asked to provide her bank account number.
When the victim declined to claim her winnings, she was threatened with being referred to the Police and sent a photograph of police officers in uniform. Afraid of getting into trouble with the authorities, the victim ended up following the instructions of the scammer to transfer money via Singtel Dash to pay for various “fees and charges”. At one point in time, the victim was also told to contact someone who claimed to be an officer from the Singapore Police Force.
Members of the public are advised to adopt the following crime prevention measures:
- Don’t panic – No government agency will request for transfer of money, personal details or bank account login credentials over the phone. Call a trusted friend or talk to a relative before you act. You may be overwhelmed by emotion and err in your judgment.
- Don’t believe – Be wary if you receive such messages or calls, especially if you have not participated in any lucky draw. Winning a lucky draw should not require any payments to be made to claim the prize.
- Don’t give – Ignore any instructions provided by the caller/message sender to make payments by remitting money or purchasing online credits and gift cards.
If you wish to provide any information related to such crimes, please call the Police hotline at 1800-255-0000, or submit it online at www.police.gov.sg/iwitness. For urgent Police assistance, please dial ‘999’.
To seek scam-related advice, you may call the anti-scam helpline at 1800-722-6688 or go to www.scamalert.sg. Join the ‘let’s fight scams’ campaign at www.scamalert.sg/fight by signing up as an advocate to receive up-to-date messages and share them with your family and friends. Together, we can help stop scams and prevent our loved ones from becoming the next victim.
SINGAPORE POLICE FORCE
23 August 2019 @ 6:15 PM