Fake lawyers promising to recover money lost to scams, says SUPP

THERE is a group of scammers pretending to be lawyers and trying to swindle scam victims in Sarawak, the Sarawak United Peoples’ Party (SUPP) warned today.

They are posting advertisements on social media claiming to be keen to help the victims recover their money taken by scammers.

This so-called “legal group” is telling scam victims to contact it by clicking on certain links online, persuading them to provide personal financial details on how they were scammed.

“Do not click on any such links or contact any such persons as the so-called legal group are scammers,” warned SUPP Public Complaint Bureau chief Milton Foo.

“If you have fallen to scams and later some people contacted you, saying that they are from a certain legal group and they promise you they can help you recover the money you lost, do not fall for it.

“No people from any legal firm can give any guarantee they can recover money lost in scams.

“There are scam victims who had alerted us that a certain legal group had claimed they know how to recover the lost money.

“This is a bogus legal group, please do not click on their links or contact them,” Foo said in a statement.

He added that scammers are not just using online social media, but also messaging groups via handphones to cheat even more people.

The latest case happened in state capital Kuching where a businessman recently lost some RM100,000 after joining a WhatsApp group that had promoted an e-trading business venture.

The businessman had deposited his money to the group via a trading platform to be used to buy online products and later to be sold for profit.

He was deceived into investing RM100,000 and only got a bit of money in return, after which the so-called trading group severed all contact with him, having taken most of the money.

Last year, it was reported that scam victims in the state had lost a shocking sum of more than RM125 million to online scammers during the 2022-2023 period.

The amount made up almost half of the total of scammed money nationwide.

Sarawak Women, Childhood and Community Well-being Minister Datuk Seri Fatimah Abdullah expressed shock and concern over the cases. She said the scams in Sarawak need to be dealt with in a more comprehensive manner.

“My ministry is liaising with the police, the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission and Bank Negara to organise a programme to try to deal with these scams that had gotten worse in Sarawak.

“Day after day, we hear of people in Sarawak losing huge amount of their money to online bogus jobs, bogus enforcement people, bogus investments schemes, bogus sales promotions ...

“Out of the RM 320 million plus of losses suffered throughout Malaysia through online scams during 2022, Sarawak scam victims accounted for more than RM125 million,” she said recently.

There is a need for a thorough community outreach and education programme to tackle such cybercrime, she had said.

Fatimah said her ministry is concerned how easily Sarawakians are duped by the scammers operating online.

Police have been issuing press releases almost daily on cases of Sarawakians lodging reports after being scammed.

Most of these victims are from Kuching, Sibu and Miri.

There were a number of them who had reported losing several hundred thousand ringgit via online bank transactions within a matter of days to online scammers. – The Vibes, January 29, 2024