Singapore has lost an astounding SG$1.1 billion ($822 million) as lawsuits fell into fraud last year.
According to annual statistics on fraud and cybercrime released by the Singapore Police, the total lost to fraudsters rose 70.6% from S$651.8 million in 2023.
The total number of fraudulent cases also rose to 51,501 cases, up 10.6% from 46,563 in 2023.
Cryptocurrency losses accounted for around 24.3% of fraud losses last year, compared to about 6.8% in 2023.
E-commerce scams were the top scam type flagged by the police, followed by employment scams, phishing scams, investment scams and fake friends call scams.
Statistics show that a single malware-enabled fraud case saw a loss of around S$125 million in cryptocurrency.
SPF said that the anti-SCAM command, established in March 2022, was able to recover fraud losses of more than S$182 million in 2024, recovering approximately S$930 million.
Through “active intervention” with victims at various stages of the fraud, the anti-SCAM command unit and its partners have avoided a potential loss of at least S$483 million, SPF added.
Over 70% of last year’s fraud cases resulted in losses of less than S$5,000, police said, with median losses per case down 12.6% from 1,590 S$1,590 in 2023 to 1,389 S$1,389 in 2024. He added.
However, a small number of cases with “very high” losses resulted in an overall increase in the total amount lost.
Cases of fraud with losses of at least 100,000 s $100,000 s accounted for 3.3% of total cases last year, but accounted for 70.8% of losses.
In particular, four cases accounted for SGD237.9 million.
Police estimated that the amount lost in these four cases accounted for 21.4% of total fraud losses in 2024.
