SINGAPORE - Efforts by retail banks to combat scams have stopped scammers from siphoning $57.6 million from their victims in the first nine months of 2023, a banking industry group has said.
In addition to that sum, anti-malware tools rolled out by banks recently have prevented further losses of at least $18.6 million, said the Association of Banks in Singapore (ABS) in a statement on Tuesday.
Responding to queries from The Straits Times, ABS said the $57.6m is the aggregate value of suspicious transactions, that were detected and intercepted by the banks’ fraud surveillance systems, as well as fraudulent transactions that have been frozen and recovered in collaboration with the Police Anti Scam Centre.
Separately, the $18.6m was derived from the bank balances of customers whose devices were compromised but did not lose their savings to scammers as their bank app access was blocked upon detection of malware, the group added.
ABS said the losses were prevented after “close collaboration between ABS and its member banks, who worked closely with the Government and law enforcement authorities, to counter scams”.
Addressing the question of whether victims would be able to get their money back, ABS said banks maintain discretionary goodwill frameworks to help customers who fall prey to scams, which will cushion them against the full financial impact of being victims of such crimes, the association said.
Banks will “seek to be accommodative” when assessing each case, and take into consideration how sophisticated the scams are and the customer’s financial situation, ABS added.
The association’s director, Mrs Ong-Ang Ai Boon, said banks are committed to doing their part to protect customers, but that public vigilance was also critical.
“The fight against scams is never ending and requires a combination of efforts from the authorities, banks and the public at large,” she said.
The association said banks will continue to introduce anti-scam measures to keep pace with ever-evolving scam tactics and the increasingly sophisticated methods used by scammers to target customers.
These measures might cause inconvenience for customers, but they are necessary safeguards and help maintain confidence in digital banking services, the association added.
For instance, a security measure introduced by OCBC on its banking app in August blocks access to the bank’s Internet banking services in the presence of a suspicious app, but the measure had initially drawn criticism from users who complained about the inconvenience.
Mrs Ong-Ang called for the adoption of good cyber hygiene and safe practices. She advised the public not to click on unknown links and to maintain a healthy scepticism against deals or promises that are too good to be true.
The ABS statement comes amid a recent surge in malware scams where criminals lure victims to download malicious software into their devices. This allows scammers to hijack mobile devices and carry out unauthorised banking transactions.
More than 1,400 victims fell prey to malware scams between January and August, with total losses amounting to at least $20.6 million.
Police statistics show that in July and August alone, there were 650 victims, nearly as many as the first six months of 2023.
