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Singapore

Former traffic police NSF fined for helping friend get info from police database

SINGAPORE: A former full-time national serviceman (NSF) with the traffic police was fined S$3,000 on Wednesday (Dec 19) for helping a friend check the police database for information.

Royce Phua Tai Da, 24, admitted to helping his friend Ivan Sim Jun Jie, 23, run a search for a man in July 2016.

The man, Desmond Chu Guan Quan, wanted to know if he was listed in the database, which is a full-fledged investigation computer system with details of victims and witnesses, among other things.

Mr Chu was worried that his business partner had implicated him in crimes.

He told his friend Joshua Woon Wei Ke about it. Woon, 23, in turn asked Sim to help as the latter had previously done NS with the traffic police.

Sim then approached Phua, who found that he did not have the authority to access the CRIMES-2 system required for running the screening, so he approached a colleague for help and gave him Mr Chu’s NRIC number.

The colleague ran the number in the system after Phua said that this was for work-related purposes.

Phua took a photo of the search results, which came up negative, and sent it to Sim.

The conspiracy was uncovered only when Woon was arrested for suspected illegal gambling, and a photo of the crime search results page was found in his phone.

ACCUSED BREACHED LIMITS OF AUTHORITY: PROSECUTION

The prosecution had asked for a fine of S$3,000, saying that Phua knew the limits of his authority and what he could and could not access, but "chose to breach those limits".

His defence lawyer said there was "absolutely no personal gain" from his actions, nor any damage to the computer system.

"He was offered a bribe, but he explicitly rejected," he added.

In response, District Judge Kenneth Yap said the problem here was that Phua accessed the database of the police, which stored "tons of information there that is highly sensitive".

"There is always harm to the system when there's a data breach," he said, adding that Phua basically tricked his colleague into helping him access the information.

The cases involving Woon and Sim are pending.

Source: CNA/ll(gs)

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