A 78-year-old man in Perak lost approximately RM1.9 million after falling victim to a phone scam involving fraudsters who allegedly posed as police officers.
Perak police chief Datuk Mohd Alwi Zainal Abidin said the victim was contacted by an unknown individual who claimed to be a police officer and told him he was allegedly involved in a criminal case.
The caller then used fear and intimidation to panic the victim, who subsequently followed the instructions given by the scammer.
“The victim was instructed to transfer his money to an unknown party, resulting in estimated losses of RM1.9 million.
“After realising he had been deceived, the victim lodged a police report,” Mohd Alwi said in a statement on Sunday.
Preliminary investigations found that the case involved a phone scam modus operandi in which the suspects impersonated law enforcement officers to gain the victim’s trust before deceiving him.
The case is being investigated under Section 420 of the Penal Code.
Mohd Alwi stressed that police would never instruct anyone to transfer money to a specific account for investigation purposes.
He urged the public not to panic or blindly trust callers claiming to be police officers, bank officials or representatives of enforcement agencies.
“Members of the public are advised to immediately end suspicious calls and never disclose banking details such as TACs, OTPs, passwords or personal information to unknown individuals,” he said.
PDRM Perak also urged senior citizens, retirees and their family members to remain vigilant against such scams.
Family members are encouraged to regularly remind elderly parents not to carry out financial transactions based solely on instructions received over the phone without first verifying the information.
