SINGAPORE, March 29 — A 75-year-old Singaporean woman lost S$600,000 (RM1.87 million) over three years after scammers impersonated Elon Musk, The Straits Times reported today.

Her daughters, Faith and Sarah Phua, discovered in April 2025 that their mother wanted to transfer S$67,000 (RM20,8577.04) to an unknown account.

“My mum said Elon Musk needed her money to help his business as it was losing money. That was when we knew she had been brainwashed,” Sarah, 45, was quoted as saying.

The family later learned the scammers had used AI to mimic video calls with Musk to convince her to hand over life savings meant for her husband’s open-heart surgery.

“She refused to believe she was being scammed. She even told us Elon Musk had introduced her to his friends, Donald Trump and Mark Zuckerberg, and she was helping to manage their finances,” Faith, 43, told the Singapore newspaper.

According to the sisters, the scammers instructed their mother to transfer smaller sums of S$1,000 to S$2,000 (RM3,113.83 to RM6,227.84)  to avoid raising suspicion.

The police issued a restriction order (RO) in July 2025 on the Phua matriarch, which limited her  banking transactions.

In Singapore, an RO is a legal tool that allows police to temporarily limit a suspected scam victim’s bank transactions to prevent further losses, under the Protection from Scams Act 2025; the Phuas were the first case.

Police said ROs are now being used to prevent vulnerable adults from falling victim to persistent scams, giving families time to intervene before their funds are completely drained.

“When the RO was first issued and our mum’s finances were restricted, she contacted a real estate agent to sell her home. When our dad refused to let her do that, she told him she wanted a divorce. They have been married for 50 years. My dad was heartbroken. We all were,” Sarah was quoted as saying.

Their mother was later diagnosed with psychosis, prompting the sisters to activate a lasting power of attorney to manage her finances.

“The calls and texts would happen in the middle of the night, so no one in our family knew about it. On video calls, the scammers would use AI to make my mum believe she was talking to Elon Musk,” Sarah added.

In a separate case in Singapore, a man in his 70s identified only as Charlie, was scammed by a “trading mentor” on a fake app, initially thinking he had earned S$80,000 (RM249,126.23) in profits.

“I thought it was an easy way to make money, but this made me realise nothing ever comes easy. And it took me losing my savings to realise that,” he told The Straits Times.