KLANG: Scammers are starting to target animal welfare organisations, and the first victims include the Paws Animal Welfare Society, Second Chance Animal Society, and Hope Johor.
This has led to two of the bank accounts linked to Paws being frozen.
Shelter manager Edward Lim said that the scammers' modus operandi is to entice people to carry out small tasks and receive small payouts.
He added that these scammers mainly operate through instant messaging platforms and had convinced people that the payouts for these tasks could be directed to charities, saying that this is how the three shelters were unknowingly implicated.
Lim then said that once trust is established in the victim, they will be coerced into making significant payments to obtain non-existent online stock and cryptocurrency investments, resulting in them (the victims) losing enormous amounts of cash.
"Investigations by the relevant authorities often result in the bank accounts of the NGOs mentioned in the scams being frozen," said Lim.
He added that even though Paws had changed bank accounts, the new account number would always be included in the scam messages.
"We were initially baffled as to why our bank account was frozen. We only realised that we were targeted by the scammers, who exploited the public's goodwill towards animal welfare organisations after the account was frozen," added Lim.
Second Chance and Hope also faced problems after small donations ranging from RM1 to RM20 were remitted into their account with strange transfer references.
The scammers had also misled donors into believing they were donating to both the shelters by creating and using fake Touch N' Go and DuitNow QR codes.
Second Chance president Kim Yeoh said the organisation had no choice but to direct the banks to freeze all incoming funds.
"It is now a daunting challenge to meet our monthly expenses of RM40,000 to sustain over 500 rescued animals," said Yeoh.
Hope's manager, Iris Leong, said the scams have made donors hesitant to contribute funds.
"This has significantly affected our operations, and it has become challenging to cover our monthly veterinary and dog food costs," she added.
Determined to counter the problem, the online animal welfare platform PetFinder.my is currently working with the three animal shelters to tighten the security of their online donation channels.
"With more secure fundraising and donor management strategies, we hope to instil greater confidence in the public," said its founder, Andy Koh.
Those wanting to help the three shelters should visit their websites for verified donation channels.
