SINGAPORE – Victims of loan scams are often led to believe they are just one transfer away from securing the money they desperately need, and those here that let down their guard last year lost a total of $18.3 million.
Others fall victim to the powers of persuasion and pressure, giving up their hard-earned savings. Singapore alone saw at least $633 million stolen in scams last year.
The tactics scammers employ, and the steps that can be taken to protect victims, are one of the highlights of the Asian Conference of Criminal and Operations Psychology that is being held this week.
Presenting their findings at the opening of the four-day event on Monday (July 18), psychologists Carolynn Misir and Lee Rong Cheng said their research showed that victims are often manipulated into thinking emotively.
This results in them making rushed and emotionally driven decisions, when they should instead stop and evaluate all of the information.
“This is what we term as a ‘cognitive break’ – to pause, step out of the situation and evaluate,” said Ms Misir and Mr Lee, who are with the Police Psychological Services Department.
They said fraudsters exploit a host of psychological techniques to dupe victims into giving information or money.
For example in e-commerce scams, victims are often hurried into making decisions, for instance, to buy lower price items that are available online for a limited time only, said the psychologists.
Last year, victims in Singapore lost $5.8 million to…
