Online Scams Targeting Blogshop Owners

This is similar to another Customer Scam on E-Commerce Website.

Blog Shop owners should take note of this.

Here is a Credit card scam that they are doing. They order from 1800.00 to 5000.00 dollars worth of product off your website by credit card. The billing and shipping address match. As soon as the order it, They want you to ship it immediately, and wear you out daily about getting the product shipped asap. It is obvious now that it was a stolen credit card because 30 days later, you will get a no authorization to purchase against your shopping cart. I was using pay-pal pro processor for my shopping cart which handles credit cards but does not give you any seller protection which I found out later.They only do seller protect on Pay-pal only and not all the time. Once the no authorization hits, pay-pal takes that amount out of your account immediately. They then fight for you to resolve the issue with the credit card company. With out letting the whole world know the outcome, the bottom line is the scammer has the product. You paid for the product and then your account gets hits for the entire amount when the no authorized purchase contacts pay-pal which puts you negative for what ever the amount was. If you send some product out, they tell their buddies and what happen to me is that 5 of them ordered product all before the first no authorization hit which means there was money and product going everywhere and in the end you have no protection on the orders, the product that did get sent you will no longer see and you will be responsible for the money on it. This has been a horrible and very expensive scam that was done to me and all I did was have products to sell on the internet from my website. My site has some very expensive items , so it did not take many items to really rack up the money which has all fallen on me. Now, I can no longer take a order from a legitimate customer because my pay-pal is in the negative. If a order comes in, it just makes my account less negative. Then you would have to try and chase that money down. It has been a nightmare to say the least. A lot of the times they ask if you take credit cards as the first email. Be very careful as these Singapore scammers are probably from Indonesia or Malaysia using freight forward addresses at the airport in Singapore. All the address's were on Airport Rd, Bldg. what ever. BEWARE..

House Rental Scam - Property Agent Scam

Dear Friends,

I just want to make aware all the people who are searching for Rented houses.

There are people in group who will put an Ad. on gumtree or other website for Rented house 2+1 or 3+1. they will ask the Rent lesser then the market price like (1400 - 1700 for 2+1) and (1700 to 1900) for 3+1.
Once people see this less price Ad and call the number which they mention in the Ad. One Lady mostly will pick the phone (some time could be guy also). Lady is of age around 30 -35 blend cut may be chinese. (Name - Melza)

She will arrange the meeting with u and show u the house and will say will paint the house and do all cleaning and other work etc.
She will say they are the Management company(TDAP) and NOT the agent. So we will take care of the house for whole tenure for any demage etc.

Once you are impressed with her talks and less rental. She will ask 2 months deposite, 1 month rent and 1 month management fees. And will ask to deposite money in her comapny account.

She will give u aggreement papar and deposit slip evrything very nicely and will agree for your move in date.
But as your move in date will come near she will say house is not available. And says I will show u another house or move u in another house for time being.

she will keep u showing many houses but will never give u those houses. And you will be stuck because youe move in date is near and u can not find new house also. If u ask ur money she will not agree for refund and if she agrees to refund she will give you a Cheque which will get bounced latar on when u deposite in your bank account. As they will issue you closed account cheque.

Many people they have targeted mostly Indain families who can not run behind them to get money back, they r taking advantage. Also they do not pay the owners and agents from whom they take houses.

Many people are their victim (I am also one of their victim). So I do not want any other people to suffer like me and others who are suffering mental and physical tortour. I compalined to police also but do not know when action will be taken care.

So plssssssssss my friends do not get traped to get Rented house on seeing cheaper Rent. And from any company says they r management company. they are 3-4 people made a gang and doing scam and fraud to innocent people. They do have company office also. do not get impressed seeing their office.

Note : they will give you all the documents very neatly (like agreement, deposit slip and money transfred slip etc.) but, at last these documents will not be helpful. Once money gone its gone.

So, pls get house only through register agents under (CEA) and ask there ID cards. and do meet owner before taking any house.

pls take all the precautions before giving your hard earned money.

Thanks for your attention. And voice out for any fraud or cheating you come accross to safe others.

A reader has posted the above rental scam on our website.

We would advise everyone to check with CEA when in doubt of the property agent.

Phone Scams Regarding Computer Being Hacked

The Singapore Police Force has warned the public not to fall prey to phone scams involving internet security. 32 cases have been reported since the beginning of this year.

On June 14, a woman had received a phone call from someone who claimed to be an employee of a well-known software company. The scammer told her that some Malaysians were trying to hack into her computer, followed by selling her a security licence in order to protect her computer.

After she handed over her credit card details, she realised S$1,300 was stolen from her account.

"I asked them to let me talk to my husband, but they said no, I had to make a decision that time, or else my computer would be blacklisted... I gave my credit card number and one-time password. Suddenly the screen went blank and some amount was charged to my account, and it was in euros," she said.

The public is advised not to divulge their credit card details to unknown person. Software company will not have your contact details. Therefore, in emergency situation, you will receive call from your Internet Service Provider (ISP), which can be Starhub, SingNet or M1. However, none of the companies would provide such security service.

Online Shopping Scams - Monroe Trends

One reader of ours is being scammed by a Facebook account selling MAC brushes and other cosmetics.

Be careful of Monroe Trends on Facebook selling MAC brushes and other cosmetics. Profile has been deleted but there might be similar scams online.

After transferring $, seller came back with an offer to buy 2 products at a discounted price. I agreed and transferred more $. Said delivery will take about 1-2 weeks as items are from Canada warehouse.

Seller then deleted facebook account and all I have is the account number. POSB SAVINGS :145-14097-8

Please be careful when shopping online, especially with individual sellers.

I got burnt this time :(

For online blogshop or Facebook page shopping, it is good to get recommendation from friends.

Serial Rapist Scams - Drugs

In this age of Internet, more and more couples have begun knowing each other through social media. It is indeed easy to make friends online because it is less awkward to be rejected via the Internet. The Internet has helped people who have less confidence or are too busy to socialise, to make more friends and find their potential halves.

However, nothing is perfect in this world. There are definitely going to be scammers who try to take advantage of our newage medium. Online dating scams emerge one after another.

We have foreign guys trying to trick Singapore ladies into "bailing" them out from the local police, Singapore couple and foreign girls extorting Singapore guys after making them reveal their private parts through webcam, foreign girls alluring Singapore guys into their websites, and the most recent news involves in a local guy dating girls out, spiking their drinks and rape them without them knowing.

Azuar Ahamad, 41, managed to take advantage of 22 women he met through SpeedDate (a Facebook application) by using drugs. His victims were aged between 18 and 41. He would bring them to a nightspot, drug them and bring them to hotel for sexual actions. He even filmed himself sexually assaulting some of the women on his mobile phone.

The victims would wake up without knowing anything since they were drugged. Azuar Ahamad would deny everything and simply claim that they were drunk and passed out.

Truth came to light when some of the women suspected and reported him to the police. However, he denied using of drugs.

Source: AsiaOne

As reported by The Temasek Times, a senior banker only realized she was raped after police officers called her. Her identity is kept confidential under a court gag order.

We are rather stunned by the number of Singapore girls who obviously have not filtered their dates whom they meet online. It is also stunning that young girls of age 18 would meet up their blind dates at nightspots.

We would like to appeal to nightspots regulars to look out for the ladies even if you are just a stranger.

Fake Gifted Tutor and Tuition Centre

Education in Singapore is very competitive and thus, parents are willing to send their children to tuition centres set up by talented tutors who have been through very good education, especially the gifted programmes. Let's not focus on the results that the tuition centres can produce, but rather, their credibility.

Do the founders of the tuition centres have very outstanding education history and have impressive experience? How about the tutors engaged by the tuition centres?

In http://news.asiaone.com, tutor Mr Kelvin Ong made the headline.

The Sunday Times reported that he had never attended National University of Singapore, and thus was not a double mathematics major graduate there.

The Education Ministry defused his claim that he was a pupil in the Gifted Education Programme, nor a teacher. After that, he pushed the blame to his mother for lying over his self-proclaimed education history, stating that he did not have the records from the past to verify it.

Anglo-Chinese School's (Primary) denied his another claim as a relief teacher over the school from 2002 to 2003 to handle the gifted classes. The long-serving teachers from ACS primary had also revealed that he was never a relief teacher there.

The Sunday Times revealed that Mr Ong had actually graduated from Nanyang Polytechnic (NYP) with a diploma in 2000. He worked as a physiotherapist at National University Hospital (NUH) before being asked to leave in 2004 over "integrity" issues. It was the same period of time when he was working at NUH that he had claimed he had been a relief teacher in ACS primary.

The paper also reported that people who knew him said that he was always trying to make money, including through tuition. He had set up Aristocare tuition centre that charged parents up to $500 per student for a 3-hour session. He justified his unworthy high tuition fees with his claims of not only having been through the gifted programme but having taught in the programme for 10 years in ACS primary. Meanwhile, some parents have demanded refunds for the tuition fees that they have paid him.

Mr Ong had told the paper that he had closed down the tuition centre and that he would not be teaching any more.

Ice-cream Scams in the Name of Boys' Town

It seems that scammers have been taking advantage of kind souls to make purchase of items in the name of charity. There is a recent similar ice-cream fundraising scam in the name of CDAC (Chinese Development Assistance Council).

We strongly hope all the kind people in Singapore will not be affected.

Below is an important announcement from Boys' Town.

Dear Benefactors, Friends and Partners of Boys' Town

It has come to our attention recently that there have been cases of youths who claim to be volunteers or boys from Boys' Town who are selling ice-cream in the streets and door-to-door.

We would like to clarify that Boys' Town has not endorsed such fundraising activity and if you have had any encounters with them, please do take down their particulars and inform us either via email at info@boystown.org.sg or call the Community Partnerships department during office hours at 67691618 so that we can inform others and the respective authorities on such activities.

There is currently no fund-raising initiative through the sale of ice-cream by Boys' Town.

Charitable organisations that are licensed to solicit funds in public would be granted a Collector's Certificate of Authority from the National Council of Social Service, or a copy of the police permit. If you are approached by any individual or group claiming to be soliciting funds for a charitable purpose, you can seek verification of the fundraiser's identity and the authenticity of the fundraising project by requesting to examine these documents.

If you are unsure of any fund-raising activity, please do not hesitate to contact us through the above email and phone number or if it is after office hours, please contact this number at 96234731 to check out the validity of the fund-raising activity.

Please do continue to support Boys Town as we seek your support and assistance in our work and mission to serve the boys who have been placed in our care.

We thank you for your support thus far.



Yours gratefully,

Irene Loi
Executive Director
Boys' Town

Source: http://www.boystown.org.sg


Do request for the identity card of the seller when in doubt!