Gen-Z TikToker falls for impersonation scam after speaking to someone who sounded like her boss
A 20-year-old Singaporean TikToker has gone viral with a video recounting how she was scammed out of $5,000. She reportedly fell for an impersonation scam by someone pretending to be her boss.
TikTok user @jaejaepeanut shared the experience in a clip captioned: “Yes, 20-year-olds get online scammed too”. She detailed how the scam unfolded and how she was coming to terms with the loss.
Source: @jaejaepeanut on TikTok
Victim claims scammer sounded exactly like her boss
The scam began with a simple call.
“Scammer basically called me and was like, ‘Do you know who I am?’ [sic]” she said.
“He sounded like my boss, so I didn’t even question it.”
Working as a personal assistant to a finance professional, Jaedyn explained that handling money transfers was not out of the ordinary in her line of work.
Source: @jaejaepeanut on TikTok
When the scammer claimed to have changed his number and asked for help setting up a new PayNow account, Jaedyn obliged without suspecting anything amiss.
“To me, it made sense … maybe he’s refunding someone, like all finance things,” she added.
Source: @jaejaepeanut on TikTok
Man on the phone denies being scammer
Over the course of the conversation, she allegedly transferred nearly S$4,000, followed by a final S$977 — the last of her bank’s daily limit.
However, her ‘alarm bells’ only rang when the caller asked for S$10,000 more.
“It’s so freaking dumb of me,” she said upon reflection.
“I literally asked him, ‘Are you a scammer?’ And he said no. And I was like, okay,” she admitted candidly.
Source: @jaejaepeanut on TikTok
Victim thought she was ‘too smart to fall for scams’
What stung most for Jaedyn was how easily she fell for the scam — despite ‘growing up’ online and thinking she was IT-savvy.
She said, “I thought I’m really tech-savvy as a Gen Z. You know when my grandma pulls up something and I’m like, that’s obviously a scam?”
“I would never fall for a scam. I fell for a scam.”
Source: @jaejaepeanut on TikTok
Her video ends with a reminder not to be complacent, especially among young people who assume scammers only target the elderly.
“It’s so easy when you’re caught in the moment and they really set it up. You just don’t think.”
Bank apparently can’t force scammers to return scammed money
Jaedyn lodged a police report within 20 minutes, but the process seemingly left her disheartened.
“The bank cannot take the money out of the scammer’s account unless the scammer approves,” she said.
“In my head I was like, if it’s that easy, wouldn’t all scammers be caught already? [sic]”
Source: @jaejaepeanut on TikTok
Jaedyn is still hoping for a recovery, but admits her chances are slim.
She noted her scammer’s number had already been reported four times on the ScamShield app, which she claimed would have saved her if she had installed it.
In the meantime, she has trawled Reddit threads on scam recovery and is urging others to download ScamShield.
Impersonation scams on the rise in Singapore
According to The Straits Times, impersonation scams are on the rise in Singapore.
In the first two months this year, S$7.2 million has been lost to impersonation scams.
Last year, over 50,000 cases of scams were reported, involving sums of more than S$1.1 billion. This is the first time Singapore’s annual loss to scams exceeded the S$1 billion mark.
Of the S$1.1 billion, the police were only able to recover about S$182 million.
Many cases involve scammers impersonating government officials or Chinese services like WeChat or UnionPay. Scammers would also inform victims of expiring subscriptions or legal troubles to trick victims into transferring money or sharing sensitive data.
Victim claims scammers tend to impersonate people with authority
Despite the emotional toll, Jaedyn remains determined.
“I refuse to let go of $5k so easily,” she said, urging viewers to share the video and reach out with advice if they’ve recovered from similar scams.
Speaking to MS News, Jaedyn shared that she hopes to bring attention to such scams through her TikTok videos.
The 20-year-old claims scammers would typically impersonate “older persons”, such as the victims’ bosses or fathers.
This creates the illusion that the younger victim has “less authority” and hence has to comply with their requests.
Unfortunately, she has yet to receive any updates on her case since her last video, posted on Wednesday (23 April).
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Featured image adapted from screenshots from @jaejaepeanut on TikTok.
