PUBLISHED ONOctober 10, 2026 4:59 AMBYSean LerA 33-year-old Malaysian man will be charged in court on Saturday (Oct 10) for his alleged involvement in a case of government official impersonation scam.
Police said in a news release on Saturday that they received a report from a 61-year-old victim on Thursday.
According to the victim, she had received a call from an unknown individual claiming to be from DBS bank.
She was purportedly informed that an unauthorised transaction was made from her bank account, and was instructed to contact a Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB) officer.
The victim subsequently called a Singapore-registered mobile number provided by the 'bank staff' and spoke with a person who claimed to be an officer of the bureau.
The 'officer' informed her that her bank account was under investigation, and instructed her to hand over her valuables to assist with investigations.
This is similar to many other impersonation scams, where scammers would ask victims to hand over cash and/or valuables for the purpose of investigations.
Most recently, two victims also fell prey to this variant of scam.
Unfortunately, the female victim believed the request to be legitimate and went on to hand over gold jewellery and other valuables worth about $10,000 to a male person on the same day.
She later lodged a police report after realising that she had been scammed.
The 33-year-old was identified by officers from the police's Cyber Command through follow-up investigations and with assistance from the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority and Police Operations Command Centre.
He was arrested within six hours of the report being made.
Police said their preliminary investigations revealed that the man had been tasked by unknown individuals, believed to be members of a transnational scam syndicate, to collect valuables or cash from scam victims and hand them over to other unknown individuals.
He will be charged in court on Saturday with the offence of assisting another to retain benefits from criminal conduct.
If found guilty of the said offence, the Malaysian man could be fined up to $500,000, jailed for up to 10 years, or both.
Members of the public are reminded that government officials will never ask any one to transfer money and cryptocurrency, or hand over luxury watches and gold over the phone.
They will also not ask for personal information such as banking login details.
Those who require more information may call the 24/7 ScamShield helpline at 1799.
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