Card skimming scammers are becoming increasingly clever. Here s how to protect yourself from ATM fraud:
- Protect your PIN
- Pick your ATMs carefully
- Get cashback from shops instead
- Keep track of your accounts
- Be suspicious
What to do when ATMs give the wrong money
Banks take a dim view of customers who pillage their accounts by withdrawing money they don't have.
Frankly, doing this is just shooting yourself in the foot, because banks have a record of every transaction from every ATM.
Using this information, banks can and do track down every unauthorised withdrawal and demand immediate repayment. In the meantime, you'll be hit by sky-high charges for creating an unapproved overdraft. Thus, the banks eventually get their own back on cash-machine bandits!
read more
Cash machine scammers jailed
They could take your money and all you’d be left with was a sense of bafflement, but after a three-month investigation the five-person “cash claw” gang have now been jailed for a total of 71 months.
Their plan was ingenious. While we’ve all become aware of the risk of skimming, card cloning, people hovering over your shoulder or using miniature cameras to record your PIN, this gang cut out the middle man.
They just wanted the cash, not the card details, so that’s what they targeted.
read more
This scam secretly steals your bank details
Watch out for this online phishing scam which uses 'tab napping' to attack your computer - and your finances...
As internet users we’re all vulnerable to online scams. Unluckily for us, as soon as we become pretty good as spotting one type of attack, another more sophisticated version comes along in its place. In fact, technology company, Mozilla - which developed the Firefox web browser - has warned against a possible threat from a new scam known as ‘tab napping’ which takes phishing one step further.
What is tab napping?
read more
The five most common scams
Scam #1: Postal scams
Scam # 2: Email scams
Scam #3: Internet scams
Scam #4 Text message scams
Scam #5: Telephone scams
read more
Internet love scams on the rise
The amount lost to Internet love scams increased from $24 million to $37 million in 2017. Getty Images file photo
Even as Singapore’s overall crime rate fell by 1 per cent last year, love cheats on the internet duped over 800 victims into parting with $37 million, an increase of more than half of the amount reported in 2016.
Also of concern last year was a 60.5 per cent rise to 207 cases of outrage of modesty (OM) on public transportation, and a 33.8 per cent increase to 107 OM cases at entertainment night spots, said the police at an annual crime briefing on Saturday morning (3 February).
Overall, OM cases increased by 22.2 per cent to 1,566 cases in 2017.
read more
Online romance scams
The 45-year-old victim, Grace (not her real name), was duped into believing she was helping to free a "close friend" who had been detained in Malaysia on suspicion of money laundering.
Her case is among 349 love scams reported to the police in the first half of this year.
The Singapore permanent resident, who had been doing business here for over a decade, met a Canadian man named Lee, 52, through a friend here last September. They went out several times and kept in touch via Facebook.
read more
Web Love Scams
Cheated - men seeking sex, women seeking love
Singapore saw a sharp rise in online crime cases last year, with men making up the biggest group of victims: More than a thousand were tempted into handing over money for sexual services that never materialized.
There were slightly over 1,200 such cases, up from just 66 in 2014, according to annual police crime statistics released yesterday.
Victims, aged from 14 to 69, were cheated out of almost $3 million in total, by women purporting to offer sex in exchange for online credits or gift cards
read more
Internet Love Scams
Soaring numbers of Singaporean women fall prey to web love scams
Soaring numbers of Singaporeans - mostly women - are falling victim to "Internet love scams" police said in a Valentine's Day warning that criminals are exploiting lonely hearts increasingly turning to the web to find partners.
The number of people robbed by online con artists faking romantic interest before tricking people out of money jumped 62 per cent between 2012 and 2013, police said in an annual crime briefing. Official figures also show e-commerce rackets doubled to 509 in 2013. The total amount reported lost to such forms of fraud in 2013 was $6.01 million, police said, a steep rise from $1.20 million in 2012.
Police said the victims of the online love scams were mainly women searching for partners in social networks and on dating websites.
read more
Protect yourself from frauds & scams
Five tips to protect yourself from ATM fraud
Card skimming scammers are becoming increasingly clever. Here s how to protect yourself from ATM fraud:
- Protect your PIN
- Pick your ATMs carefully
- Get cashback from shops instead
- Keep track of your accounts
- Be suspicious
related:
