30% of users of online payment system ‘ignore scam alerts involving HK$600m’

Up to 30 per cent of users of a major Hong Kong online bank payment system have ignored scam alerts and gone ahead with transactions, with half a million warning messages sent in the past four months, police and financial authorities have revealed.

Chief Superintendent Raymond Lam Cheuk-ho of the force’s cybersecurity and technology crime bureau said yesterday 505,000 scam alerts were sent to users of the Faster Payment System (FPS) between the launch in November of the warning system and March. The half a million alerts involved potential losses of HK$600 million.

Arthur Yuen Kwok-hang, deputy chief executive of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA), said between 20 and 30 per cent of FPS users had continued with transactions despite receiving scam alerts. A rate of 30 per cent would suggest more than 151,000 alerts were ignored.

“We are not sure about the circumstances, we and police are looking into that,” Yuen said.

“It could be that they are actually fraudsters themselves, but to the extent there are people disregarding the alerts and falling victims to the scams, we think they are not making the best use of the alert.”

Since November, FPS users have received a warning when they enter details of recipient accounts flagged by the police force’s Scameter database as “high risk” for having a history of involvement in fraud.

FPS was introduced in 2018 to allow users to transfer money using proxy identification, such as a mobile phone number or email address.

Yuen, who was speaking at a launch ceremony for an expanded anti-fraud alliance between the authority, financial regulators and local businesses, said the HKMA would seek to expand the feature to other bank-to-bank money transfers by the end of this year.

Police identified at least 22,000 FPS proxies that were used for scams and money laundering in the first nine months of last year.

HKMA chief executive Eddie Yue Wai-man said the number of complaints about unauthorised credit card transactions fell by 30 per cent in the second half of last year to 332 cases from 478 in the first six months.

“This shows our [anti-scam] charter and other measures are beginning to show their effectiveness. This cooperation can also help the public prevent such scams better,” Yue said at the ceremony.

The HKMA announced three financial regulators, as well as 13 local businesses, had joined its Anti-Scam Consumer Protection Charter 2.0 to combat phishing fraud.

Businesses that have signed the charter will refrain from sending instant text messages containing hyperlinks to collect personal information in a bid to guard against fraudsters sending phishing messages under the guise of these firms.

Selected companies regulated by the Securities and Futures Commission, the Insurance Authority and the Mandatory Provident Fund Schemes Authority will also follow suit.

Merchants joining the charter yesterday included Cathay Pacific Airways, three bus operators, Sun Ferry Services and travel agency KKday.

The Airport Authority Hong Kong, the Travel Industry Authority, the Consumer Council and the police force have also pledged to support the charter.

Yuen said transport firms were targeted in this round of signatories as their contact with the public had risen since the lifting of pandemic-induced travel restrictions, adding he hoped to have the city’s entire commercial sector under the charter to combat rising phishing attacks.

Lam said police had intercepted 40 phishing cases that used a new tactic in the fourth quarter of last year, with scammers posing as e-commerce platforms to ask customers to download software that was actually malware.