S’pore Retiree Lost S$45K After Installing “Computer Clean Up” Programme

Last Updated on 2023-05-10 , 10:29 am

Imagine this: You’ve been searching for the perfect programme to help speed up your computer, and you finally find what you think might just be the exact programme you need.

But it ends up being a scam instead.

While that might sound too unlucky to be true, that’s what happened to a retiree in Singapore after he installed a “Clean-Up” programme on his computer.

Unfortunately, the only thing it ended up cleaning was the retiree’s bank account.

In total, he lost around $45,000.

Downloaded Programme After Seeing It on an Advertisement

When speaking about his experience with Shin Min Daily News, the unlucky retiree revealed that he felt that the processing speed on his computer was too slow for his liking.

The man, a 71-year-old named Chen Shu (Hanyu pinyin), added that he first retired three years ago.

On 13 January this year, he decided to download a “Clean Up” programme onto his computer after seeing an advertisement for it appear on his computer screen.

The programme claimed to clean up and optimise the speed of users’ computers.

However, Mr Chen decided to uninstall the programme on the same day as notifications from the programme kept appearing on his computer screen.

Bank Called Him About Suspicious Transactions Around Two Weeks After Installing Programme

A little over two weeks later, on 31 January, Mr Chen received a call from his bank in the early hours of the day.

The bank told him that 47 suspicious transactions had been conducted via his account since 2 am that day and asked him to check his account’s transactions.

By then, the bank had also frozen his account.

Would Have Lost More Money if Bank Did Not Freeze Account

After checking his account’s records, he realised that these transactions were all under $1,000 each.

This meant that he was not aware of the transactions as he would only have been informed via message if the transactions were over $1,000.

In turn, this also meant that he might have lost even more money if the bank did not step in to prevent further transactions.

Lost $45,000 in Total, Made Police Report Afterwards

Mr Chen also revealed that he initially had around $90,000 in his bank account at first.

In total, the suspicious transactions caused him to lose approximately $37,000.

Hence, he filed a police report the next day.

He also went to the bank to suspend all transactions and electronic bank transfers through his credit card.

Afterwards, Mr Chen had a gut feeling that something else was wrong, leading him to check if anything had happened to another bank account that was also registered under his name.

To his horror, he found out that over $8,000 from his other account had been transferred out of it through 27 different transactions.

He then recalled the computer clean-up programme that he had installed over two weeks ago.

The police later suspected that the details of both his credit cards might have been stolen due to Mr Chen’s act of downloading the programme.

Had to Come Out of Retirement and Start Working Again

When reflecting on the incident, Mr Chen revealed that the two affected accounts were his “most commonly used” accounts.

They were also one of the sources of his retirement savings.

However, after losing half of his savings, he started feeling panicky over possible financial difficulties in the future.

This prompted him to come out of retirement and return to work.

Mr Chen added that he is now a part-time property management supervisor and that his choice to return to work was out of necessity.

Or as we say, “bobian-ness”.

When contacted by Shin Min, the police confirmed that they were aware of the case and that investigations are currently ongoing.

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How to Prevent Getting Scammed

In a society today where online scams are rampant, here’s what you can do to prevent being scammed.

ScamAlert, which is set up by the National Crime Prevention Council (NCPC), offers advice on how to spot scams on its website.

It also offers aid for those who have been scammed by instructing them on what actions to take next.

Those who require scam-related advice can also call the ScamAlert hotline at 1800-722-6688 on weekdays from 9 am to 5 pm (excluding public holidays).