FURTHER MOVES BY BANKS, MAS

The Monetary Authority of Singapore and banks will “progressively introduce additional measures” to combat malware-related scams, as part of their anti-scam efforts, said the police on Wednesday.

In August, OCBC became the first bank in Singapore to block some customers from using its internet banking and mobile banking app if it detected potentially risky apps downloaded from unofficial portals.

This was a new security measure implemented to protect customers from malware, OCBC said at the time.

The move drew negative feedback from some users, who complained that apps like online payment platform Alipay were among those flagged by OCBC’s security measure.

The police said the security measure deals with the danger of downloading apps that are not from the official app stores. Malware-related scams are often carried out through apps downloaded from third-party or dubious sites.

“Such apps may contain malware and can result in confidential data, such as banking credentials, being stolen,” the police noted.

“While there may be some measure of added inconvenience for customers, these additional anti-malware measures are necessary to protect customers from malware-related scams.”

In June, additional authentication measures were also introduced to increase protection for CPF members in light of the rise in malware-related scams. Those who log in to their accounts using their Singpass may now have to go through face verification. CNA

For more reports like this, visit cna.asia.