SINGAPORE – A man who allegedly collected money from scam victims before moving the funds to cryptocurrency wallets overseas was charged on Jan 11.

Tay Beng Kok, 47, also known as Zheng Minge, was charged with two counts of possessing monies which were benefits from criminal conduct and one count of providing illegal payment services.

He is alleged to have had in his possession $35,000 in a Citibank account in April 2023 and $50,000 in cash in March 2023, which were monies that were, in whole or in part, another person’s benefits from criminal conduct.

It is also alleged that he had, between Feb 1 and May 5, 2023, illegally provided a digital payment token service to a person known to him only as “Lizy”.

Court documents said Tay had accepted money through his POSB, UOB and Citibank accounts with the purpose of buying more than $320,000 worth of cryptocurrency that was transferred to wallets belonging to “Lizy”.

On Jan 10, the police said they received reports in May 2023 of an Internet love scam in which money was transferred to a bank account belonging to a man.

Investigations later revealed he had been operating multiple bank accounts which had received funds from dubious sources. The funds were converted to cryptocurrency before being transferred to overseas digital wallets.

The police added that in further investigations, they found that in March 2023, the man received instructions from a woman he had become acquainted with on an online dating application.

Acting on her instructions, he is believed to have collected $50,000 in cash from another victim of a scam near her workplace, said the police.

The police warned that scammers are recruiting people to receive and transfer stolen money on their behalf, and may also cultivate potential money mules through online dating platforms to facilitate the transfer of illegal proceeds.

Members of the public are advised to reject requests to use their bank accounts to receive, transfer or collect money on behalf of another person for bank transfers.

Tay has been offered bail of $15,000, and his case is expected to be heard again on Feb 15.

If convicted of possessing benefits from criminal conduct, he may be jailed for up to 10 years, fined up to $500,000, or both.