Updated The Monetary Authority of Singapore says it is considering supervisory action against Southeast Asia’s second largest bank, Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation (OCBC), which was criticised for its incident response to a widespread phishing scheme across the island nation.
“Monetary Authority Singapore (MAS) takes a serious view of the recent phishing scams involving OCBC Bank. They have significantly impacted several customers. OCBC has acknowledged that its incident response and customer service should have been better. MAS has been following up with the bank on these and broader issues relating to the incident,” said MAS deputy managing director Ms Ho Hern Shin in a statement to The Register.
The phishing scheme first appeared at the start of December 2021 and became more aggressive through the holiday period. By the end of the month, the Singapore Police Department reported the scam had affected 469 customers and taken over SG$8.5m (US$6.3m/ £$4.62m).
Victims receive an unsolicited SMS that appears to be from the bank and asks the account holder to click a link to resolve account issues. Once that link is clicked, victims are redirected to a fake bank website where they provide their login details. They won’t know they’ve been scammed until they receive a notification of unauthorized transaction charged to their account.
“Once the funds have been fraudulently transferred out of the…
