Malaysia’s financial sector prevented about RM1.9 billion in attempted fraudulent transactions in the first half of 2026, already surpassing the RM1.2 billion blocked throughout 2025, as authorities intensify efforts against increasingly sophisticated technology-driven financial crime.
Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) Governor Datuk Seri Abdul Rasheed Ghaffour said more than RM37 billion in assets had also been recovered over the past five years, reflecting stronger coordination among enforcement agencies, financial institutions and other stakeholders.
Speaking at the 16th International Conference on Financial Crime and Counter Terrorism Financing on Tuesday, Abdul Rasheed warned that artificial intelligence was making fraud faster and harder to detect.
He said about 95% of online fraud cases involve victims being deceived into transferring funds themselves, while AI-generated content can increasingly imitate voices and appearances to facilitate social engineering scams.
The central bank is consequently pushing the financial industry towards more predictive and preventive fraud controls rather than relying primarily on detecting suspicious transactions after they occur.
BNM said the banking industry and PayNet are developing industry-wide fraud alert capabilities that could warn banks and customers of potential risks before transactions are completed.
A pilot involving selected banks is targeted for the first half of 2027, ahead of wider implementation.
The alerts are intended to prompt customers to stop and verify suspicious transactions before proceeding. BNM acknowledged that this could introduce some additional friction for customers but said it was necessary to balance convenience with protection against fraud, particularly scams where victims authorise transactions themselves.
Separately, the National Fraud Portal has been testing payment-network analytics since October 2025 to identify possible mule accounts.
PayNet has so far flagged more than 1,600 suspicious accounts, many of which were subsequently assessed as carrying mule-related risks. BNM said the exercise showed how network-level information across financial institutions could uncover threats that may not be visible to an individual bank.
Abdul Rasheed said geopolitical fragmentation, new payment channels and increasingly seamless cross-border financial flows are creating additional opportunities for illicit activity, requiring financial institutions and regulators to continually reassess risks.
Malaysia currently has more than 27,000 financial and non-financial reporting institutions operating under its anti-money laundering and counter-financial crime framework.
The governor said stronger information sharing between public and private institutions, as well as greater international cooperation, would be crucial as criminal networks increasingly operate across national borders.
