SINGAPORE: At least 2,000 people fell victim to concert ticket scams in the country, involving losses of SGD$1 million (approximately RM3.48 million) in the first five months of this year.
Most of the cases involved tickets for Taylor Swift's concert tour, the police told The Straits Times (ST).
The cases also involved scams related to tickets for concerts by Bruno Mars, Ed Sheeran, and Coldplay since the beginning of this year.
The police have closely collaborated with social media operators and e-commerce platforms to remove fraudulent advertisements for concert tickets and accounts involved in such scams.
This includes the e-commerce platform Carousell, which suspended the sale of Taylor Swift concert tickets on its platform between February 23 and March 9 to prevent users from being duped.
Carousell's Chief of Staff, Tan Su Lin said that victims purchased the tickets in a rushed manner and did not heed warnings such as seller ratings in March.
Regarding the Swift concert ticket scams, Assistant Commissioner of Police Aileen Yap informed ST that reports were made, including from victims who purchased tickets from resellers.
They realised that the tickets they bought were fake when they couldn't gain entry to the stadium where the concert was supposed to take place.
Aileen said that in the first few days after the American pop star arrived in Singapore in March, the number of reports related to concert ticket scams increased.
Aileen also warned that concert ticket scams would escalate, raising concerns about public safety.
This is particularly worrying when fans fly to Singapore for concerts but are unable to enter the concert area because the tickets they bought are invalid and counterfeit.
According to the police, at least 1,551 victims fell victim to e-commerce scams involving concert tickets, with losses totaling at least SGD$737,000 (approximately RM2.57 million) from January 1 to March 12, 2024.
This figure increased to over SGD$1 million in May, due to more concert organisation announcements in Singapore.