S'porean tech investor, 44, falls prey to malware scam, loses S$100,000 in 24 hours

A 44-year-old man, who has been an angel investor in digital products for years, recently lost S$100,000 after falling prey to a malware scam.

After coming across a recruitment notice seeking testers for a new game project, he agreed to participate and chatted with someone he thought was from the product team.

24 hours after installing the game launcher, his money was gone.

Seemed proper

Speaking to Lianhe Zaobao, Mark Koh, 44, shared that he has been investing in Web3 products since 2017.

Web3 refers to the concept of a decentralised internet and encompasses technology such as blockchain and cryptocurrency.

On Dec. 5, Koh came across a message in a Telegram group chat seeking testers for a game project called "MetaToy".

A user by the name of Shanni contacted him afterwards and explained that they were one of the co-founders from the "Meta team".

To feign credibility, Shanni claimed to have past work experience at cryptocurrency firms.

Koh recounted that the team answered his questions patiently and did not pressure him into anything.

"As someone who has evaluated numerous Web3 projects, I consider myself good at spotting scams. And this project seemed proper," Koh commented.

Malware

Koh later downloaded a game launcher as instructed.

"The anti-virus software on my computer detected a malware, so I did a scan and deleted all the suspicious files. I thought I was safe at that point," he said.

As a precaution, Koh even wiped and reinstalled the computer operating system.

However, that did not get rid of the malware.

"24 hours later, all my digital wallets that were connected to the internet were wiped clean," he shared.

Koh suspects that the scammers had used a real product to induce people to download the malware-laden game launcher off a fake website.

"This was not a mistaken transaction, but a hacking of my operating system," he pointed out.

"I've always advocated for safekeeping your assets digitally, but that did me in this time," the 44-year-old admitted.

Koh's losses amounted to S$100,000.

While he felt terrible about his losses, he was more worried about potentially implicating others who had transacted with him in the past.

He has since made a police report.

A reminder to others

Koh is a co-founder of a group called "RektSurvivor", which offers free support services to victims who have lost cryptocurrency assets.

Now, he has become a victim himself.

"I'm aware of the irony. I hope the authorities can do something," he said.

"I'm sharing my experience to warn others to stay guarded. This is a sophisticated scam. Even after the various steps I've taken to encrypt and add layers of verification, I still became a victim," Koh told Zaobao.

Following the incident, Koh has come to the realisation that anyone can fall prey to scams.

For those holding onto cryptocurrency, he reminded them not to share their wallet's encryption key with anyone.

"And don't put all your crypto assets in one wallet," Koh added.

Top image via Lianhe Zaobao