Xfers is proud to receive a commendation from the Singapore Police Force (SPF) during an appreciation ceremony held at the Police Cantonment Complex on 23rd May 2018. A commendation plaque was given as a form of recognition to our support rendered to the Police during the investigation of a series of cybercrime activities. Xfers has an active and ongoing relationship with the authorities with the aim of preventing and stopping cyber crimes.

How did Xfers detect the fraudulent transactions?

The investigation into the case began in May 2016 when our transaction monitoring system detected potential signs of fraudulent transactions and triggered a block on the suspected account’s transactions. A preliminary investigation was carried out by our customer support team to determine the authenticity and nature of the activity. When the preliminary investigation revealed genuine concerns regarding the affected transactions, a special task force made up of representatives from Xfers’ customer support, compliance, and public relations teams were formed to manage the issue.

The investigation concluded that the transactions were fraudulent in nature and a the case was escalated to upper management. In line with Xfers’ internal protocol, the issue was reported to the relevant authorities such as the Criminal Investigation Department, Technology Crime Investigation Branch (CID-TCIB) for further consultation, investigation, and action.

Shortly after, Xfers was informed by our main contact from CID-TCIB that a victim filed a police report and the affected transactions were in fact fraudulent. Following the police investigations, it was found out that the money involved belong to six victims. The largest amount recovered from the fraud by for one of the victims is approximately S$40,000.

What’s next?

Xfers will continue our efforts in maintaining a secure payment platform and ensure our users monies are protected and handled with care.

Building on this successful detection and recovery, Xfers has started three main initiatives to continue our fight against cyber crimes. Those initiatives are:

• Training & case-studies — The continuing effective training of our team members on anti-money laundering and detecting suspicious transactions, especially with the use of recent case studies in order to illustrate our policies and procedures.

• Evaluation & improvement of security and monitoring systems — The need of continuous improvement of our platform, and internal software systems for fraud and transactions monitoring.

• Pre-emptive approach to crime prevention — To stay ahead of criminals and frauds, we update ourselves with knowledge of the latest criminal trends and their modus operandi. With the Alliance of Public Private Cybercrime Stakeholders (APPACT) partnership, we have a quick and direct line of communicating with the police and more importantly, a direct line to other financial institutions that may be involved in the transaction.

We take this opportunity to dedicate the award to all the staff involved in this case and others, especially the customer service and compliance team for the outstanding effort in ensuring processes are in place and the accurate evaluation of the situation which resulted in the successful stopping of the fraudulent transactions.