21 OCT 2026 — Singapore used its turn at the 20th ASEAN Ministerial Meeting on Transnational Crime in the Philippines on 20 October to ask fellow member states to back two regional anti-scam instruments, one of them a code setting minimum safeguards that online platforms would be expected to meet. Senior Minister of State Goh Pei Ming made the case in Singapore's country statement, which the Ministry of Home Affairs published the same day. Ministers have not yet released the meeting's joint statement or any declaration, so what follows is what governments have put on the record so far.
Who met and where
The Philippines is both this year's ASEAN chair and the host of the meeting. Interior Secretary Juanito Victor Remulla chaired the meeting, and Singapore's statement is addressed to him as chairman. Goh, who holds posts at both the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Ministry of Social and Family Development, spoke for Singapore's delegation and began by thanking the Philippines as host.
Remulla opened with a figure that puts the scale of the problem in dollar terms. "Reports have associated online scamming operations in parts of Southeast Asia with potential annual economic losses of approximately $114 billion," he said, in remarks carried by Arab News in a report from Manila. He also argued that the offences reinforce one another. "Cybercrime, online scams, trafficking in persons, forced criminality and money laundering feed each other, and they operate across multiple jurisdictions," he said.
Singapore's two scam proposals
Singapore is the volunteer lead shepherd for ASEAN on cybercrime and scams, and that is the hat under which it has put forward the two initiatives. The first, an ASEAN Code of Practice, "will establish baseline anti-scam safeguards for online platforms", according to the statement. Goh said it draws on Singapore's own codes for online platforms and would help member states "push platforms to take more proactive and upstream action against scams".
The second is an ASEAN Best Practices Guide on Combatting Scams for police and other enforcement agencies, focused on cross-border asset recovery and enforcement. Whether ministers adopt either text is not yet known.
The figures Singapore put forward
Goh opened his scam section by calling the situation "deeply alarming". He cited the Global Anti-Scam Alliance as finding that more than half of adults worldwide experienced a scam in 2025, and that 23% lost money.
Those regional figures are far below Remulla's estimate. The two ministers used different sources and different measures, and neither statement tries to reconcile them. Singapore's own picture was mixed. Scam losses among Singaporeans topped US$700 million last year, Goh said, even as reported cases fell 28% and losses 18%, the first such drop in eight years.
What Singapore says already works
Goh pointed to recent domestic measures. Singapore's Parliament has recently passed a Scams (Countermeasures) and Other Matters Act, and designated online services must already detect and prevent scams under codes issued through the Online Criminal Harms Act. Those codes include fast-track channels for police reports, with action required within a set timeline.
The Singapore Police Force began running its Cyber Command in July 2026. Under it, a National Scams List lets police share data such as mobile and bank account numbers with banks, telcos and platforms in real time, so linked accounts can be found and shut. The Anti-Scam Centre and its partners stopped at least US$99 million in potential losses in the first half of this year, the statement said. GovTech has joined the Global Signal Exchange, a cross-border channel for scam intelligence.
Across borders, Goh said FRONTIER+ operations in ten jurisdictions had led to more than 3,000 arrests, with US$161 million seized from upwards of 102,000 frozen bank accounts. The network has 15 members, among them Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand alongside Singapore, and he invited other governments to join.
Drugs and terrorism on the same agenda
Scams were one of three areas in Goh's remarks. "The regional drug situation continues to deteriorate," he said, citing record methamphetamine seizures of 349 tons in East and Southeast Asia in 2025, up 48% on the year before, and ketamine seizures of 52.5 tons, up 185%. Singapore is seeking a second term on the United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs, for 2028 to 2031.
On terrorism, he said self-radicalisation online remains the main domestic driver, noting that in recent months three self-radicalised Singaporeans, aged 14 to 19, were held under the Internal Security Act over plans for separate attacks.
How this builds on Melaka
The scam push follows a year of groundwork. At the previous meeting in Melaka on 10 September 2025, ministers adopted a regional declaration on cybercrime and online scams, with Singapore credited for leading its development, according to the joint statement from that session. They also widened the cybercrime priority area to cover online scams, adopted a ten-year plan of action for 2026 to 2035, and welcomed the Philippines as the next chair.
If ministers agree, a code of practice would turn the Melaka declaration into requirements that platforms can be measured against. The Manila joint statement, once published, should show whether they did.
