Singapore orders Meta to implement anti-scam measures or face possible fine

Singapore police have ordered Meta to implement anti-scam measures against advertisements, accounts, profiles and business pages impersonating key government office holders on its social media network Facebook to combat scams, a government minister said.

The company could be fined up to S$1 million if it fails to comply as part of the first such order under the nation’s new Online Criminal Harms Act, which came into force in February 2024.

“We are issuing (the order) to Meta because Facebook is the top platform used by scammers for such impersonation scams, and the police has assessed that more decisive action is required to curb these scams,” Minister of State for Home Affairs Goh Pei Ming said in a speech on Wednesday (Sep 3).

In August, Singapore’s home affairs ministry found that more than a third of all e-commerce scams reported in 2024 were perpetrated on Facebook. It also rated Facebook Marketplace as the weakest among six e-commerce marketplaces in terms of anti-scam features deployed.

A Meta spokesperson said on Wednesday that the company had specialised systems to detect impersonating accounts, including facial recognition technology, and it had invested heavily in improving detection and review teams. It also shares tips on avoiding scams and offers tools to report potential violations, the spokesperson said.

“We also rolled out advertiser verification and continue working with law enforcement and take legal action against the criminals behind these scams,” they added.

Police statistics released in August showed that scams that involved the impersonation of government officials almost tripled to 1,762 cases in the first half of 2025, from 589 cases in the same period a year ago. A total of S$126.5 million was lost to this type of scam in the same period, up 88 per cent from the S$67.2 million lost a year ago.

The home affairs ministry acknowledged Facebook Marketplace has required “enhanced user verification measures” for select sellers in Singapore since 2024, and that it introduced in-product safety notices, as well as anti-scam notices within its messaging functions to warn users of the risk of e-commerce scams.

Those measures were deployed after earlier criticism by the government over the company’s failure to put in place safeguards that protect users from scams. REUTERS