Macau scam cases are on the rise with losses amounting to hundreds of millions of RM yearly❗
The syndicates would prey on such victims, using fear as the ultimate tool in duping them to surrender their savings
The scammers would pose as officers 👮♂️ from the authorities, including the police or Bank Negara. Some would even pretend to be from a bank or other companies such as Pos Malaysia.
Police also received cases where the scammers posed as the victim’s family members or friends. 👨👩👦
Bukit Aman Commercial Crime Investigation Department (CCID) director Comm Datuk Zainuddin Yaacob said 5,725 cases were reported in 2019 involving RM254.5mil in losses.
The cases continued to spike to 6,003 cases in 2020. The total losses increased to RM287.3mil.
The modus operandi has not changed much as the scammers will say that you are under investigation for some case.
They will intimidate you and threaten to put you behind bars.🚨
“The police will never handle cases over the phone, let alone threaten to arrest someone, ” he said.
Comm Zainuddin said a scammer would also advise the victim to transfer their money to avoid it from being frozen during a phone call.
He reminded the public that police and other government agencies do not have interconnectivity, which means the police officer can only transfer a call to a colleague and not to a completely separate agency.
“There is no such thing as Bank Negara Malaysia officers transferring your call to a police investigation officer or vice versa. We do not work that way, ” he said, "we would only set up an appointment over the phone so that other arrangements pertaining to any case can be made at the police station, ”
Macau Scam syndicates often use mule accounts, where the victims would be directed to transfer their money to, Comm Zainuddin said.
“However, some syndicates have directed the victims to open a new bank account and connect the account to a phone number supplied by the syndicate. This will enable the Transaction Authorisation Code (TAC) numbers generated for transactions to go directly to the syndicate’s phone number, ” he said.
Besides enforcement efforts against the syndicates, CCID had introduced various initiatives to increase awareness against Macau scams including setting up of the CCID Scam Response Centre.
Comments