SINGAPORE: The Attorney-General’s Chambers (AGC) issued a public advisory statement on Oct 25 (Wed) about a scam letter a member of the public received overseas that contained not only the AGC letterhead but also the signature of an alleged officer.
The AGC attached a scanned copy of the letter in the statement, with the information about the recipient and the name of the alleged officer redacted. The body of the letter stated that the recipient was being charged “500 million Indonesian rupiah for justice” (S$43,000) in connection to “suspected money laundering.”
“This letter is a fake and was not sent by AGC,” the statement says, adding that the AGC does not request members of the public to transfer monies to third-party accounts. It also pointed out a number of typographical and grammatical errors, which the AGC calls tell-tale signs of the letter being fraudulent.
The AGC advised members of the public to stay vigilant against scams and not give out personal information to suspicious or unknown parties, including your name, identification number, passport details, contact details, bank account or credit card details.
People who receive this or any other suspicious letter claiming the AGC sent it should not communicate with the sender. They should also contact the AGC at agc@agc.gov.sg to verify the authenticity of letters they receive and consider filing a police report.
“If you wish to provide any information related to such scams, please call the Police hotline at 1800-255-0000, or submit it online at www.police.gov.sg/iwitness,” added the AGC, which is the public prosecutor of the Republic of Singapore as well as the legal adviser to the government.
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In the past, scammers have already misused important government officials, including Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, in their quest to perpetrate these fraudulent activities. In July, scammers used PM Lee’s image to promote cryptocurrency scams.
In April of last year, Health Minister Ong Ye Kung posted a warning after members of the public alerted him and the Health Ministry that a doctored photo of him was used to endorse what purported to be a health product.
In 2019, Deputy Prime Minister Heng Swee Keat announced that he filed a police report over his photo being used to spread fake news. DPM Heng put up on his Facebook account a sponsored post from an entity called ‘Well Vacation,’ which supposedly links to an article titled, “The Nation Says Goodbye To Finance…”. /TISG
Read also: Singaporeans Hit Hardest by Global Scams, Losing Over US$4,000 Per Victim