SINGAPORE: Alan Teng is not any stranger to crimes, having beforehand served as a police prison investigator for 13 years.
But few circumstances sicken him fairly like scams.
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Now the top of DBS Bank’s anti-scam staff, Teng, 49, recalled an early case when the staff was shaped in 2019. A girl in her 50s had transferred her total financial savings of S$170,000 (RM535,058) to scammers who had posed as Chinese officers.
Her bank account regarded suspicious because the oddly massive transaction was linked to a international bank account that had been flagged for cash laundering, mentioned Teng.
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After an hour-long telephone name with the girl, Teng lastly satisfied her that she was being scammed. During the decision, the girl had spoken on speakerphone on the urging of the scammers who manipulated her as they eavesdropped on the decision.
Teng defined to her the everyday ways utilized by such scammers to trick victims – that they might rush her to make a massive transaction and urge her to mislead the authorities.
The lady realised she had been conned as these have been the exact directions given by the fraudsters.
Teng mentioned the bank managed to freeze her account earlier than the cash was transferred to the scammers.
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Among the primary to induce the bank to launch a devoted anti-scam unit, Teng mentioned he remembered this incident clearly because it proved it was possible to cease scams earlier than cash was misplaced.
The staff’s mission is to detect and stop scams by analysing transactions and dealing with the police to flag suspicious accounts.
Last 12 months, the staff helped to get better S$35mil (RM110.15mil) misplaced to scams by freezing 5,300 bank accounts linked to scams.
The police beforehand mentioned that this quantity is roughly a third of the S$103mil (RM324.18mil) of scam cash recovered in 2021.
Teng mentioned: “All crimes are bad, but especially so when a person takes advantage of the vulnerable and robs them of all they have.”
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DBS is the one bank with an worker – Yaznisham Yazid, 29 – on the police Anti-Scam Centre (ASC) to work with officers to foil scams sooner.
He will likely be joined by extra DBS officers who will likely be completely deployed on the centre round June.
It is known that different banks will comply with go well with later this 12 months.
Yaznisham recalled stopping a sufferer from dropping S$220,000 (RM692,428) to scammers by freezing her account the second it was flagged by the police final 12 months.
Officers then visited her house for investigations – all inside one afternoon.
Yaznisham mentioned: “It was done in half a day. Previously, this would have taken longer. Scams happen really fast and there is no time to waste…
“With scams rising, having more people here at the ASC would help us ensure that we stay on top of the timely freezing of any accounts and recovery of funds.” – The Straits Times (Singapore)/Asia News Network
