Singapore to cane scammers as billions lost in financial crimes
24 comments
·November 4, 2025OkayPhysicist
radpanda
I’ve never been there but whenever I read something about it I get the vibe that they’re an HOA with a military.
veqq
> What would you even call their socioeconomic system?
China economically functions similarly to Singapore, with long documented connections and explicit emulation. In 1978, Deng Xiaoping already began this and hundreds of thousands of Chinese officials and leaders were trained there and in industrial parks with the explicit goal of knowledge sharing with the dream of "planting 1000 Singapores". [0, 1, 2, 3]
> fascist states, but without the typical racist scapegoating
Tangential, but Hitler added racism; Mussolini, Salazar, Franco/de Rivera (who used large Arab and Berber forces fighting the Republicans in Spain) etc. had none of that (until Hitler forced Mussolini's hand in 1938). Brazilian integralists and many other fascisms also weren't racially based.
[0] https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/3042046/does... [1] https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/24761028.2021.1... [2] https://www.fairobserver.com/economics/china-and-its-mentor-... [3] https://www.thinkchina.sg/politics/construction-singapore-mo...
linohh
You might want to freshen up your history lessons with maybe some less revisionist sources, because Mussolini-wise I have some bad news for you.
OkayPhysicist
Eh, that's giving Mussolini more credit than he deserves. A core component of his platform was conquering swathes of Africa on colonial grounds.
Simulacra
It could really just be the money.
potato3732842
>What would you even call their socioeconomic system?
Asian Switzerland.
And if that offends anyone it ought to be the Swiss (and any fanboys they may have who take offense on their behalf).
anthem2025
[dead]
idle_zealot
> What would you even call their socioeconomic system? They're not exactly doing neoliberal capitalism, their government is far too involved for that. They're not socialist, they've got free enterprise galore. The autocracy+militarization+heavily meddled with big business thing most resembles fascist states
It's just State Capitalism, isn't it? Like China. A market-based economy with free enterprise, but no illusions of egalitarianism or democracy, enables the state to step in and manage and direct the market with effective regulation. In a democracy the state can manage this for a time, but eventually a private entity or group of entities leverages their power to influence law and co-opt democratic power, so the market starts steering its own regulation and you end up with fascism as a means of population control or a Russia-style cleptocratic oligarchy. We have not yet figured out how to sustain democracy + capitalism, if it's even possible.
I worry that most will see the rise of countries like Singapore and China and the relative decline of the US/EU and conclude that democracy is a failed project all together.
OkayPhysicist
China does have illusions of egalitarianism, though. They don't call themselves the "Communist" party without reason. And enterprise, to my understanding, is much, much freer in Singapore than it is in China.
neuchatel1968
"Disneyland with the death penalty"
Gigablah
Meanwhile, the US carries out extrajudicial killings over drugs
djaouen
> "The country also passed a new law earlier this year that would allow the police to control the bank accounts of individuals who they suspect to be scam targets and limit what transactions they can do."
This is crazy to me. How far are we willing to go in terms of restricting freedoms for safety?
reissbaker
But this is just part of how Singapore is different than America and Europe. China has even stricter controls in terms of limiting what individuals can do with their bank accounts (you can't transfer money to non-Chinese-citizens at all!).
Western countries put enormous value on personal liberty — America probably the most so, but even EU countries are extremely liberal in a liberty sense compared to historical norms, and even compared to some well-functioning economies today like China and Singapore. It's interesting, since I think the idea of personal liberty is so deeply engrained in many of our consciousnesses that we couldn't conceive of living like that. But... plenty of people do, and they're happy about it.
tom_
If you live in Singapore: don't ask us! If you disagree, vote against the government, and/or get out on the streets and protest!
If you don't live in Singapore: it's not your problem.
kelipso
It’s practically a one party state, no? And I’ve heard lots of stories of protesters getting disappeared after the police arrest them. Easy to say these things.
iepathos
The erosion of freedom is everyone's problem. Normalizing government control over personal bank accounts is a dangerous precedent. Today it's scam prevention, tomorrow it's freezing accounts of political opponents.
idle_zealot
Human rights are everyone's problem.
markdown
A much more restrictive form of this has long been normal in the US; called conservatorship.
The cops adding checks and balances to delay you from wiring $50,000k overseas is a great government looking out for the vulnerable.
2OEH8eoCRo0
Kyle Davies of 3AC first?
tomcam
No. It's sad that you would think that way.
The obvious correct answer is Bob Weilbacher, who fired me with no reason given from my cherished $3.75/hour job in the mailroom at Cal State Fullerton back in 1979.
Singapore is an odd country. The only country, to my knowledge, that had independence thrust upon it without its consent. Extremely prosperous compared to its neighbors. An autocratic, single party state where the government is so popular that they need to rig their elections against themselves to get dissenting voices. One of the most militarized countries (#3 by military spending per capita) in the world, yet their military has barely been used.
What would you even call their socioeconomic system? They're not exactly doing neoliberal capitalism, their government is far too involved for that. They're not socialist, they've got free enterprise galore. The autocracy+militarization+heavily meddled with big business thing most resembles fascist states, but without the typical racist scapegoating (on the contrary, they've put a frankly inordinate amount of effort into preventing racial infighting).
In most countries "The country also passed a new law earlier this year that would allow the police to control the bank accounts of individuals who they suspect to be scam targets and limit what transactions they can do." would probably set off alarm bells, but it does seem like business as usual in Singapore.