SINGAPORE, Feb 28: Singapore is considering various proposals on how to best compensate scam victims, parliament was told on Friday.
Minister of State for Home Affairs Sun Xueling told lawmakers that setting up a consolidated fund for victims to recover the money they lost poses operational challenges.
At least SGD 1.1 billion (USD 822 million) was lost to scams in 2024, and the Singapore Police Force managed to recover more than SGD 182 million of scam losses in 2024, making the net loss about SGD 930 million.
Sun was responding to a question from a lawmaker about whether the government has considered establishing a scam victim restitution fund financed by the confiscated proceeds from recent money laundering cases.
For example, the authorities cannot ascertain that all the money recovered by the Anti-Scam Centre all come from scams, the Channel News Asia reported, citing Minister Sun speaking in parliament.
The syndicates that run these scams often operate other crime business lines as well, including illegal money lending, said Sun.
“There could be other proceeds that pertain to other forms of crime, and therefore there are other victims who may also similarly feel that they have a claim to those proceeds,” she said.
Tracking whether a dollar that was recovered is the same dollar lost by a victim is also difficult because of the commingling of funds, said Sun.
Especially in cases where cryptocurrency is involved, it is often very difficult to ascertain which victim that dollar was scammed from, she noted.
As a result, with a consolidated restitution fund, it would be difficult to tell which victim has a right to the money that was recovered, said the minister of state.
The money recovered is a fraction of the amount lost to the scams, Sun stressed.
“There are going to be far more claimants for the monies than there are actually proceeds, in the monies that are recovered,” said Sun.
Even if victims can recover some of their funds, it would be a “tiny fraction” of what they lost in the first place, she added.
Law and Home Affairs Minister K Shanmugam had said on Wednesday that assets surrendered to the state as part of the SGD 3 billion (USD 2.2 billion) money laundering case are progressively being liquidated and returned to government coffers.
A total of 54 properties, 33 vehicles and 11 country club memberships were liquidated as of December 2024, and proceeds from the liquidation of non-cash assets would be paid into the government’s consolidated fund, he had said in parliament. (PTI)
Follow our WhatsApp channel
