$46,000 lost in WhatsApp impersonation scams since January: Police

SINGAPORE – At least 20 reports of scammers taking over the WhatsApp accounts of users have been lodged since January 2024, with at least $46,000 fleeced from the users’ contacts.

The police on Aug 6 warned of a resurgence of the messaging app scam – first reported in October 2023 – in which scammers gain control of users’ accounts through fake “WhatsApp Web” login pages.

The scam works by leading users who intend to open WhatsApp on their browsers to fake, or phishing, webpages after they search for the WhatsApp webpage on search engines like Google.

Clicking on the top few bogus results without verifying the links would take them to phishing sites embedded with a genuine QR code extracted from the official WhatsApp website.

When the QR codes are scanned, scammers would gain access to users’ accounts on their desktops, police added.

Since users would still be able to use WhatsApp on their phones and computers, they would not detect the breach.

Scammers then use the compromised accounts to reach out to potential victims from the users’ WhatsApp contacts.

They impersonate the WhatsApp user to dupe victims into transferring money, usually by claiming that funds are urgently needed and their bank accounts have been restricted, for instance, because they “exceeded transfer limits”.

Victims would be asked to transfer money to the bank accounts or PayNow numbers given by the scammers.

In November 2023, at least 93 people fell for the same scam and lost $176,000.

Individuals are advised to enable two-step verification on WhatsApp and check the URL of webpages they visit. The correct URL for WhatsApp Web is

https://web.whatsapp.com

Users should also check their linked devices in the WhatsApp settings tab regularly and log out of devices they no longer use.

For information on scams, go to 

www.scamalert.sg

 or call the Anti-Scam Helpline on 1800-722-6688.