Imagine a scammer convinces someone that they owe money to a government agency and must transfer funds immediately to avoid arrest. The victim genuinely believes it, ignores warnings from their bank, their children, or their friends, and prepares to transfer their life savings. Under a law that came into force in mid-2025, the police in Singapore now have a tool to step in and stop that transfer before it happens, even if the victim insists they are not being scammed.
This is the Protection from Scams Act 2025, and it represents one of the more unusual powers Singapore has given its police force in recent years, because it allows the state to restrict a person’s own bank account for their own protection.
Why This Law Was Needed
Scam losses in Singapore have been staggering. In 2024 alone, victims lost 1.1 billion dollars, a record high, and more than four out of five reported scam cases involved victims voluntarily transferring money themselves after being deceived, rather than scammers directly accessing their accounts. These are known as self-effected transfers.
The particularly difficult cases are the ones where victims are so convinced by the scam that they refuse to believe warnings from banks, family, or even the police. Officers would previously come across cases where they knew someone was in the middle of being scammed, but had no legal basis to stop the person from transferring their own money, since it is their own account and their own decision, at least on paper. The Protection from Scams Act was designed specifically to close that gap.
How Restriction Orders Work
The Act was passed in Parliament on 7 January 2025 and came into effect on 1 July 2025. Its central feature is the Restriction Order, or RO, which allows specified officers, including police officers and Commercial Affairs officers, to instruct a bank to restrict an individual’s banking and credit facilities.
An RO can only be issued if an officer has reasonable belief that the person will transfer money to a scammer, withdraw money to hand over to a scammer, or apply for and draw down a credit facility to benefit a scammer. Crucially, the law treats this as a last resort. Officers are expected to have tried other ways to convince the person first, including bringing in family members to help, before reaching for a Restriction Order.
Restriction Orders are issued by default to Singapore’s seven Domestic Systemically Important Banks, the large banks that hold the vast majority of consumer accounts. If there is reason to believe a smaller, non-systemically important bank is also involved, an RO can be extended to that bank as well.
What Happens to You If a Restriction Order Is Placed on You
Being placed under a Restriction Order does not mean your money disappears or that you lose access to it forever. The law allows a person under an RO to apply to the police for access to funds needed for legitimate purposes, such as daily living expenses or paying bills. These requests are assessed case by case, so there is a process rather than a blanket freeze with no way out.
Joint account holders are also given a route to apply for a variation of the order, allowing a transfer or withdrawal subject to whatever conditions the police set. Once the period specified in the order comes to an end, normal access to banking and credit facilities resumes automatically.
As of 15 February 2026, only 12 Restriction Orders had been issued since the law came into force, with one already lifted after the individual was assessed to no longer be at risk. This suggests the power is being used sparingly and precisely, rather than broadly, which matches how Parliament described it during the law’s passage.
Getting the Order Lifted
An RO is not meant to be permanent. Once the police assess that a person is no longer likely to be scammed, whether because they have understood the deception or the immediate threat has passed, the order can be lifted. The law also allows the individual, or in some circumstances their family, to provide information relevant to the police’s assessment, which can support having the order reviewed sooner.
This structure reflects a broader shift in how Singapore is thinking about scam prevention. Rather than only prosecuting scammers after victims have already lost money, the government is trying to give the police room to intervene while a scam is still unfolding, even if that means temporarily overriding a person’s usual freedom to manage their own bank account.
The Kinds of Scams This Law Is Built to Stop
The Act is written broadly enough to cover both remote scams, meaning cheating carried out through calls, social media, or other digital and telecommunication channels, and more traditional cases of cheating carried out in person. In practice, the scams most likely to trigger a Restriction Order are the ones where a victim is being pressured to move money quickly and refuses to accept that anything is wrong.
Common examples include impersonation scams, where a caller pretends to be a police officer, a bank employee, or a government official and convinces the victim they must transfer funds urgently to avoid arrest or account closure. Love scams, where the victim has built a long relationship with someone online who eventually claims to need money for an emergency, are another category, since victims in these cases are often deeply emotionally invested and resistant to intervention. Investment scams, where a victim is promised unusually high returns and keeps sending more money to unlock supposed profits, also fit the pattern the law was designed for, particularly once family members or bank staff have already tried and failed to convince the person to stop.
Part of a Bigger Anti-Scam Push
The Protection from Scams Act does not operate on its own. It sits alongside other measures Singapore has introduced to tackle the scam problem from different angles, including tighter rules on SIM card sales to make it harder for scammers to reach potential victims, and separate criminal law changes that introduced much harsher penalties, including caning, for people who run or facilitate scams.
Where those other laws focus on stopping scammers from operating in the first place or punishing them after the fact, the Protection from Scams Act is unusual because it focuses on the moment in between, when a scam is actively happening and a victim is at risk of transferring money, but has not yet done so. Banks have also become more active partners in this effort, since they are often the first to notice unusual transaction patterns that suggest a customer may be caught up in a scam, even before the police are formally involved.
Frequently Asked Questions
Will I be notified if a Restriction Order is placed on my account?
Yes. The law includes provisions for notifying the individual when a Restriction Order is issued, cancelled, or varied, so it is not designed to operate silently without the account holder’s knowledge, and you should be informed close to when it takes effect.
Can I challenge a Restriction Order if I believe it was wrongly issued?
Yes, the Act includes a formal appeals process. If you believe you are not actually being scammed and the order is unnecessary, you can raise an appeal, which will be considered based on the circumstances of your case rather than being automatically dismissed.
Does a Restriction Order affect my credit score or show up on my credit report?
The Act is focused on temporarily restricting access to banking and credit facilities to prevent a scam related loss, rather than being a punitive credit action. It is not designed to function like a default or a black mark on your credit history in the way a missed loan repayment would.
Can a Restriction Order be placed on a business bank account, not just a personal one?
The Act as designed is targeted at protecting individuals from scams, particularly self-effected transfers by a person acting in their personal capacity, rather than being built around corporate or business banking arrangements, which are generally governed by different rules.
What should family members do if they suspect a loved one is being scammed but the police have not acted?
Family members can approach the police with their concerns, and officers may use that information as part of building the case needed to issue a Restriction Order. The law specifically anticipates that families play a role in helping convince a victim, and their input can factor into the decision on whether to act.
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