SINGAPORE: In Parliament on Monday (Nov 11), the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) introduced the Protection from Scams Bill, a law that would give the Police the power to restrict the bank transactions of a person believed to be a scam victim, even when that person denies that they are being scammed.
“This will enable the Police to better protect targets of ongoing scams who refuse to believe that they are being scammed,” the ministry said in a media statement announcing the new Bill.
Scams have increased nearly fivefold from 2019 to 2023, from around 9,500 to around 46,600 cases. Last year alone, about S$650 million was lost to scams.
Although a number of safeguards have been introduced to protect people, the number of scam incidents has stayed high.
In particular, cases involving people transferring funds to scammers. For the first six months of this year, 86 per cent of reported scams were this type, where victims were manipulated into transferring money to scammers.
The MHA said in its statement that victims continued to transfer money to scammers despite being told by Police, banks, or family members that they were already being scammed, including cases of investment scams and government official impersonation scams.
The statement said these types of scams have had high average financial losses, adding that at the moment, the Police have no power to prevent victims from transferring funds to scammers if they insist on doing so.
With the Protection from Scams Bill, the Police would be empowered to issue Restriction Orders (RO) to banks to restrict the banking transactions of the victim if there is a reasonable belief that the individual will make money transfers to a scammer.
MHA added that an officer may issue an RO if there is reasonable belief a person will execute a money transfer to a scammer and if the RO is necessary to protect that person.
However, the order will only be issued as a final resort when other options to persuade the victim have been exhausted.
With an RO, a victim’s money transfers into other accounts via online banking, mobile banking, PayNow, and in-person over-the-counter; ATM usage, credit card transactions, personal loan and other credit facilities will be restricted.
The restrictions will be in effect for 30 days at a time, with possible extensions if the Police deem this necessary. ROs can be cancelled early when the person is no longer at risk of being scammed.
These ROs are for scam cases only, and the Bill does not cover traditional cheating cases such as money transfers to an acquaintance or family member or those to an errant renovation contractor.
“We will put in place a mechanism for an individual (who is the subject of an RO) to have access to his monies for legitimate reasons (e.g., sustain daily living, pay bills).
These cases will be assessed on a case-by-case basis upon the individual’s application to the Police,” MHA added. /TISG
