There is a new variant of the police impersonation scam going around, warned the Singapore Police Force (SPF) in a news release today (Jan. 30).

Victims would receive a Short Message Service (SMS) text message from “CID of Singapore”, informing them that their ATM card had been suspended for security reasons and that further transactions would be disabled.

When recipients try to contact the number, a person at the other end of the line would pretend to be the police and ask victims to provide their internet banking details and One-Time Password (OTP) in order for their ATM cards to be reactivated.

The Police emphasised that such SMS messages are not sent by them.

So far, no one has lost any money to this scam.

Prevention measures

In the news release, the Police advised members of the public to take the following crime prevention measures:

1. Don’t panic – Remain calm and do not reply to the SMS message.  Block and report the number as spam.
2. Don’t believe – Ignore the instructions and do not call the number shown in the SMS message.
3. Don’t give – Do not provide your personal details, bank account information, Internet banking credentials and One-Time Password (OTP).  Such information is useful to scammers.

If you wish to provide any information related to scams, you can call the Police hotline at 1800-255-0000, or submit it online. For urgent police assistance, you can call "999".

Those who wish to seek scam-related advice can call the anti-scam helpline at 1800-722-6688 or go to www.scamalert.sg for more information.

Read how this lady was scammed of her life savings over a Viber call:

Top photo adapted from Singapore Police Force.