10 men charged over unauthorised address changes using ICA online service

SINGAPORE: The police charged 10 men on Tuesday (Dec 9) over their suspected involvement in a series of unauthorised attempts to change registered residential addresses through an Immigration and Checkpoints Authority's (ICA) e-service.

The case was first made public by ICA on Jan 11, after it discovered about 80 cases of unauthorised attempts to change registered residential addresses via an "others" option - which allows the change of address by a proxy - available on the online service.

The charges laid against the 10 men - aged between 17 and 32 - bring the total number of people charged in connection to the case so far to 14, said the police and ICA in a joint news release on Tuesday.

"Investigations by the police and ICA have revealed a criminal network that allegedly intercepted ICA PIN mailers, which were then used to change the registered residential addresses of their victims," said the authorities.

"The criminal network had allegedly done this in order to receive Singpass password reset mailers, which enabled them to take over the victims’ Singpass accounts."

Of the 14 people charged, three are believed to be the key actors, while the rest are believed to have played supporting roles, said the authorities.

Police said one of the key actors, 25-year-old Lee Ming Shen, was handed eight charges on Tuesday, including for offences under the Computer Misuse Act for abetment to disclose Singpass access codes and supplying their credentials to others, and for abetment under the National Registration Regulations in falsely applying for residential address changes.

Another nine suspects were also charged on Tuesday. They are: Loh Fu Ling, 18; Klein Kong Yan Kai, 20; Serrure Cho Jing Cong, 25; Toh Zheng Han Bryan and Muhammad Nur Hakim Abdullah - both 32 - along with four 17-year-olds. 

Alleged mastermind Ng Wei Chang, 30, Yuen Mun Fei, 39, and Koh Hong Yan, 27, were all charged in January, along with Chaing Bang Xuan, 32.

On Tuesday, the police filed additional charges against Yuen, Koh and Chaing. Ng was handed 42 additional charges in July and November. 

As the alleged mastermind, Ng had allegedly fraudulently made the unauthorised residential address changes and compromised 18 Singpass accounts.

Chaing, one of the key actors, is believed to be a facilitator who allegedly obtained NRIC details and recruited runners. On Tuesday, he was handed additional charges, including for transferring benefits from criminal conduct under the Corruption, Drug Trafficking and Other Serious Crimes Act.

The other 11 men allegedly played supporting roles such as acting as intermediaries to transmit photos of PIN mailers, giving their own Singpass or bank account credentials for monetary gain, and falsely applying for residential address changes.

Seven others who were arrested in relation to the case also received 24-month conditional warnings in lieu of prosecution.