Singapore – Scams have existed since ancient times, with the first recorded attempt in 300 BC. In the 1990s, it was the Nigerian Prince scam that bamboozled many of their hard-earned money.
The Nigerian Prince scam, also known as 419 scams, works by randomly chosen people receiving snail mail or electronic communication regarding an important public figure, sometimes even a prince, needing to get their wealth or “government funds” out of the country.
Since the initial versions of the scam involved a “Nigerian Prince” requesting your help transferring his money out of the country, the racket gained the moniker “Nigerian Prince Scam.”
The prince would then promise the individual a portion of his wealth if he could use their bank account for the transfer. However, the individual must first transfer or deposit some money to the “prince” as a sign of trust or for “administration fees” often not specified.
Once the unaware individual transfers the money, the “prince” disappears, or worse, drains your account before becoming unreachable.
It was reported that the scam still robbed over $700,000 (S$945,000) from Americans in 2018.
The scam was first mentioned in Singapore in 1991, with The New Paper highlighting swindlers “flooding Singapore with letters promising to pay” millions of dollars.
Despite the logical approach of targeting the older generations who are less tech-savvy, the scammers actually went after businesspeople and companies.
The letters were disguised as an investment opportunity with a commission that could yield millions.
On Aug 2, 2021, a woman was sentenced to seven years and four weeks’ jail for helping Nigerian scammers move more than S$2 million out of Singapore, using over 20 bank accounts to secure their criminal proceeds.
The Singapore Police Force announced that S$201 million was lost to scammers in 2020, a jump of 140 per cent compared to 2019 as more Singaporeans turned to online transactions amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
According to The Straits Times, scam victims lost S$168 million to fraudsters operating under the top 10 scam categories during the first six months of 2021.
“The rising number of scam victims is testament to the increasing psychological sophistication of scammers’ tactics ¬in crafting false proof, impersonating the victim’s close friends and using the victim’s shame about possibly falling for a scam to continue extracting money from them,” noted hometeamns.sg.
Here are the top 10 scams in Singapore, in no particular order:
• E-commerce
• Social media impersonation
• Internet love
• Credit-for-sex
• Chinese officials impersonation
• Tech-support
• Bank-related phishing
• Loans and investment
More information on the scams can be found here./TISG
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