A 41-year-old lecturer was duped of RM1.3 million after being misled by a call from a scammer who claimed to be a police officer.
The woman, who works at a public university, received a call in October last year from someone who introduced himself as a Health Ministry official and accused her of being involved in a fake Covid-19 report in Sabah, said Johor police chief Comm Datuk Kamarul Zaman Mamat.
“When the lecturer denied it, her call was transferred to another person who identified himself as ‘Inspector Ku’ from the Sabah police headquarters.
“This so-called officer accused her of being linked to money laundering and drug cases and that police were investigating her involvement,” he told a press conference at the state police headquarters in Johor Baru yesterday.
Comm Kamarul Zaman added that “Inspector Ku” then instructed the lecturer to open a new bank account and give the banking details to him.
He said the victim was told to transfer all of her savings into the new account for safekeeping until the “investigations” against her had been completed.
The lecturer, somehow, agreed to do so.
“She transferred about RM1.3 million between Oct 17 and Nov 25 last year to the new account,” Comm Kamarul Zaman said.
According to him, the woman began to realise that she had been duped after noticing that a few transactions had been made to unknown accounts.
She lodged a police report on Saturday. – The Star