The Commercial Affairs Department (CAD), Police Intelligence Department (PID) and the seven land divisions of the Singapore Police Force (SPF), together with the Cyber Security and Technology Crime Bureau (CSTCB) of the Hong Kong Police Force (HKPF), had jointly crippled a transnational job scam syndicate operating from Hong Kong.
In recent months, the Police have seen a rise in the number of job scam cases. In these scams perpetuated by the Hong Kong syndicate, the syndicate would post advertisements for jobs promising quick cash on different social media platforms. The job would require the victims, ie the job seekers, to assist in improving the sales of online platforms, which included Taobao, HKTV Mall, and some malicious mobile apps such as 銘城 and 點點. The victims would subsequently be told to make payments by transferring funds to different bank accounts. In return, the victims would be promised reimbursements of the full sum with 5-12% of commissions.
The scammers would purportedly reimburse the victims and give them commissions in the initial stages in order to convince the victims that it was a legitimate job, and to induce them to deposit increasingly larger sums of money to earn more commissions. At this point, the scammers would promise commissions only after a certain number of tasks had been completed and would delay payments. The victims would only realise they had fallen prey to a scam when they did not receive the subsequent reimbursements and commissions.
Following extensive joint investigations between SPF and HKPF, 14 core members of the syndicate comprising 12 men and two women, aged between 22 and 53, were arrested by HKPF between 16 and 18 June 2021 for their suspected involvement in a total of 134 cases of job scams in Hong Kong involving HKD9 million (approx. SGD1.56 million).
Through extensive sense-making and intelligence probe, the SPF managed to detect potential victims who could have received the unsolicited text, WhatsApp and Telegram messages from the scammers. Since 20 May 2021, CAD’s Anti Scam Centre (ASC) has contacted more than 660 potential victims to advise them of this job scam variant. At the same time, the ASC has also terminated more than 270 phone numbers and frozen more than 80 bank accounts, which were suspected to be linked to this scam variant.
Through collective efforts of CAD, PID and seven land divisions, 23 men and four women, aged between 16 and 53, were arrested and/or investigated for their suspected involvement in job scams. Preliminary investigations indicated that they had allegedly facilitated in bank transfers, funds withdrawals, or had relinquished their bank accounts to the scam syndicate.
Director CAD, Mr David Chew said, “The transnational crime syndicate had targeted unsuspecting victims in many jurisdictions, including Singapore. In this instance, they had enticed potential job seekers with promises of highly paid jobs that allowed them to work-from-home. The Singapore Police Force will continue to collaborate closely with our counterparts to prevent, detect and deter these transnational syndicates which exploit the anonymity of the internet to commit crimes. I would like to thank the CSTCB of the HKPF for their strong support and commitment in our joint fight against these scam syndicates.”
The Police would like to advise members of the public to follow these crime prevention measures:
- E-commerce platforms will never ask you to transfer money on the promise that they will refund you with a commission. If it is too good to be true, it probably is. Do not accept dubious job offers that offer lucrative returns for minimal effort;
- If you are randomly invited into a messaging application group chat that you suspect is promoting a scam, report the group chat using the in-app function immediately to prevent others from falling prey to scams;
- If possible, always verify the authenticity of the job with the official websites or sources; and
- Do not click on suspicious URLs or download applications from unknown sources.
You can also call the Anti-Scam Hotline at 1800-722-6688 or visit www.scamalert.sg to seek scam-related advice. 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. Fighting scams is a community effort. Together, we can help stop scams and prevent our loved ones from becoming the next scam victim.
Exhibits seized from operations in Singapore
SINGAPORE POLICE FORCE
29 June 2021 @ 4:15 PM