DBS bank and the Supreme Court warns against serious phishing scams

DBS/Facebook

SINGAPORE — DBS bank on Wednesday (Jan 19) issued an alert about SMS phishing scams after a screenshot of a message received by a customer about the "suspension" of his account was circulated online.

According todayonline, the message said that the customer’s access to some services had been "cut off" and attached a link for the customer to click to confirm his details.

In a Facebook post, DBS urged customers not to click on the link in the SMS message.

“DBS will never ask for your account details or OTP (one-time password) over the phone, email or SMS. Please be assured that we are actively taking down such phishing sites,” it said in the post.

This latest SMS scam came in the wake of a recent phishing scam involving nearly 470 OCBC bank customers, who lost a total of at least S$8.5 million after being sent fake text messages that appeared in the same thread as legitimate messages by OCBC for OTPs and transaction alerts.

The swindlers impersonated the bank by having their sender’s name as “OCBC,” claiming that there were issues with the customer’s bank accounts or credit cards and instructing them to click on a link in the SMS message that led the customer to a fake banking website.

OCBC said on Wednesday that it would fully reimburse all victims for the money they lost through the scam and arrangements would be made by next week.

Scammer also hit the Supreme Court

The Supreme Court has also warned the public to be wary of phishing emails appearing to be from the judiciary.

Todayonline reported that these emails would inform recipients that they are being served a letter from the court, which is shared via Dropbox Business.

In an advisory issued on Wednesday (Jan 19), the Supreme Court said that the email would show up from [email protected] by the “Supreme Judiciary Council” and contain a PDF attachment that reads “GOV.SG-LETTER011822.PDF”.

“The emails will usually request personal information such as name and identification details including National Registration Identity Card number or the Foreign Identification Number of individuals,” it added. 

The court reminds the public that the judiciary does not use the @judiciary.gov.sg domain name to send emails to members of the public or ask for information to be sent via Dropbox Business.

Recipients of such an email are advised not to respond, disclose any personal or banking details to the sender, download any attachment or click on any web link provided in the email.

Those with case-related queries may contact the Supreme Court Registry by email at [email protected] or by phone.