Bursa Malaysia Berhad supports the announcement made by Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) on 23 June 2023 to take action against Meta for failing to remove undesirable contents relating to amongst others, scam advertisements, on its platform.
The Exchange has been the target of scams with ill-intentioned impersonation of Bursa Malaysia and its management on social media platforms – in particular Datuk Muhamad Umar Swift, its Chief Executive Officer.
The Exchange has found an alarming number of these impersonations over Facebook, in fact over 60 pages this year, with a spike in recent months.
As alerted through past media statements and social media postings, the Exchange reiterate that these fake pages and sponsored advertisements have no relation to Datuk Muhamad Umar Swift nor the Exchange.
Any form of communication, other than via the Exchange’s own verified and official website and social media channels, is not authorised or lawful, and is designed to mislead or cheat the public.
This includes any form of communication purportedly from the Exchange’s Chief Executive Officer or any of its Board members or personnel.
While the Exchange takes prompt action to raise attention to detected scams and report the cases, the Exchange is very concerned that the time taken for removal of such pages by the relevant bodies, greatly increases the risk of innocent and unknowing members of the public revealing personal information and/or being duped, if they were to fall for such unauthorised solicitations or invitations.
Even with the actions taken by the Exchange, fake pages impersonating Datuk Muhamad Umar Swift with corresponding sponsored advertisements continue to emerge on Facebook and other social media sites.
The alarming incidence and rise of these scams via fake pages are of serious concern and the Exchange calls on Meta and all other social media entities to take swifter action to minimise or prevent malicious, misleading and/or illegal activities.
“Despite submitting recurring take down reports that establish a very simple and clear pattern of impersonation, we are very concerned that incidents of the same nature continue to occur. We need the relevant entities, including Meta, to put in place algorithms or checks to prevent, or quickly detect and put a stop to these blatant scams, which thrive on identity theft and fraud,” said Datuk Muhamad Umar Swift.
Similar scam tactics have been found on other notable Malaysian figures and companies. “Meta as an organisation should take further steps to prevent confusion and fraud among its users, and reputational damage and negative brand association to the affected individuals or entities” added Datuk Umar.
According to the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), a total of 744 reports on online scams involving Facebook from January to 25 May 2023 were reported.
In May 2023, Minister of Communications and Digital Fahmi Fadzil also called out the slow response time by Meta at detecting scams2. Globally, there has also been calls by other jurisdictions for Meta to be more responsible or held accountable for abetting scams.
The public are advised to continue being vigilant and not fall prey to scams. They can also play a role in preventing online scams by reporting any scams that use Bursa Malaysia’s name, logo, or representative.
The Exchange would like to reiterate to the public that Datuk Muhamad Umar Swift and other Bursa Malaysia representatives do not and will not run sponsored advertisements nor issue invitations to ‘exclusive stock tips’ groups.
Should members of the public receive unsolicited or suspicious communications relating to, or claiming to be agents of Bursa Malaysia, please email [email protected] or call 03 – 2732 0067 to authenticate the content of any such communication. Remember, when in doubt, always verify and report.
