Google launches SG$2.6m anti-scam grant to strengthen online safety in SG

Google has launched a SG$2.6 million grant to fund anti-scam efforts in Singapore, marking the tech giant's largest ever support to a Singaporean social impact organisation. 

The SG ScamWISE initiative aims to protect 100,000 undeserved youths and seniors against scams and online threats by 2026.

With this grant, the organisation, Bamboo Builders, will partner with the Tech for Good institute to conduct research on scams in Singapore and Southeast Asia. It will also partner with local organisations to conduct anti-scam training and work with youth ambassadors to raise awareness on scam prevention. 

Don't miss: Google and Meta accused of secretly targeting teens on YouTube

Google will also be launching its third YouTube Creators for Impact program, supported by the Ministry of Digital Development and Information (MDDI). As part of this program, local creators will raise awareness of online harms prevalent among Singaporean youth such as cyberbullying and image-based sexual abuse.

In addition, Google will be partnering with the Singapore University of Social Sciences (SUSS) to develop a first-of-its-kind rigorous trust and safety professional training course to develop more trust and safety experts in Singapore and the Asia-Pacific region.

Through this multidisciplinary curriculum, participants will learn from trust and safety experts about policy, enforcement, legal matters, and other relevant areas.

The course will cover a wide range of online safety topics, including misinformation, online scams, and emerging issues such as AI safety and responsibility.

These efforts come after Google's partnership with the Cyber Security Agency of Singapore in February where it launched an enhanced fraud protection feature within Google Play Protect for all local Android devices. 

Launched first in Singapore, the feature protects mobile users against malware scams by blocking potentially risky sideloaded apps.

Since February, the feature has blocked nearly 900,000 high-risk app installation attempts on over 200,000 devices. Many of these apps are impersonations of popular messaging apps, gaming apps or eCommerce apps that were potentially used for fraud, said Google in a statement.

Following which, the government will be launching a new 'Play' feature that will show a "Government" badge on authentic government apps. 

Last week, Google was accused of reportedly making a secret deal with Meta to target 13 to 17-year-olds with Instagram ads on YouTube, breaking the search giant's rules against advertising to children, according to the Financial Times. 

According to Financial Times, the Instagram campaign "deliberately targeted a group of users labelled as 'unknown' in its advertising system".

It added that Google knew 'unknown' skewed towards under-18s and that documents seen by the publication suggested "steps were taken to ensure the true intent of the campaign was disguised." 

When MARKETING-INTERACTIVE reached out, Google said last week that it "prohibits ads being personalised to people under 18, period. These policies go well beyond what is required and are supported by technical safeguards. We've confirmed that these safeguards worked properly here. We'll also be taking additional action to reinforce with sales representatives that they must not help advertisers or agencies run campaigns attempting to work around our policies.”

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