Budapest Post

Cum Deo pro Patria et Libertate
Budapest, Europe and world news

Interpol seeks woman who ran elaborate exam cheating scam in Singapore

Interpol has issued an alert for a woman behind an elaborate exam-cheating scam in Singapore which involved phones and headphones taped to students.
Poh Yuan Nie, 57, fronted the racket together with three accomplices, who have all been jailed.

Poh, the former principal of a local tuition centre, had been due to begin a four-year sentence last September, but failed to surrender herself.

She is thought to have fled Singapore.

Police in the city-state issued an arrest warrant for Poh, also known as Pony, last November.

They applied for the Interpol "red notice" the following month and have appealed for information on her whereabouts.

A red notice is a request to law enforcement agencies worldwide to locate and arrest a person pending extradition or similar legal action.

The scam took place across several days in October 2016, during sittings for three tertiary entrance exams.

According to local media, Poh's Zeus Education Centre was engaged to provide tuition to six students - aged 17 to 20 - to help them pass their exams and enter local vocational colleges known as polytechnics.

Poh was paid 6,000 US dollars per student, as well as$1,000 in admission fees - but the money was to be fully refunded if they did not pass.

The students, all Chinese nationals, sat for the papers at different venues while wearing skin colored in ear headphones.

Mobile phones and Bluetooth devices were taped to their bodies by Poh and her accomplices, and carefully concealed under their clothes.

Poh's ex-girlfriend Tan Jia Yan, then aged 30, also sat for the papers as a private candidate. She did so with a camera phone attached to her chest via sticky tape, and hidden beneath her clothes.

Using FaceTime, Tan broadcast a livestream of the papers to Poh, her niece Fiona Poh and an employee Feng Riwen, who were waiting at the tuition centre.

The trio then worked out the answers and fed them to the students via their headphones. "If I heard them clearly, I should keep silent, if not, I should cough," testified one student.

The scheme unravelled when an exam supervisor heard unusual transmission sounds coming from one of the students, who came clean when questioned.

In 2020, Poh, her niece and Feng were convicted of 27 counts of cheating. They were each jailed for between two and four years.

A judge had called on the trio to testify in their defence, but they chose to remain silent. The prosecution argued that an adverse inference should be drawn from this, including the ultimate inference of guilt.

In 2019, Tan was jailed for three years on the same charges. At her sentencing, District Judge Kenneth Yap said that the sanctity of national exams had to be protected.

"The notion that students can buy results by resorting to cheating is offensive. It undermines the principle of meritocracy. It can't be that the rich can procure exam results," he said.
AI Disclaimer: An advanced artificial intelligence (AI) system generated the content of this page on its own. This innovative technology conducts extensive research from a variety of reliable sources, performs rigorous fact-checking and verification, cleans up and balances biased or manipulated content, and presents a minimal factual summary that is just enough yet essential for you to function as an informed and educated citizen. Please keep in mind, however, that this system is an evolving technology, and as a result, the article may contain accidental inaccuracies or errors. We urge you to help us improve our site by reporting any inaccuracies you find using the "Contact Us" link at the bottom of this page. Your helpful feedback helps us improve our system and deliver more precise content. When you find an article of interest here, please look for the full and extensive coverage of this topic in traditional news sources, as they are written by professional journalists that we try to support, not replace. We appreciate your understanding and assistance.
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Elon Musk Unveils Grokipedia: An AI-Driven Alternative to Wikipedia
Russia’s President Putin Declares Burevestnik Nuclear Cruise Missile Ready for Deployment
US Administration Under President Donald Trump Reportedly Lifts Ban on Ukraine’s Use of Storm Shadow Missiles Against Russia
White House Announces No Imminent Summit Between Trump and Putin
China Presses Netherlands to “properly” Resolve the Nexperia Seizure as Supply Chain Risks Grow
Merz Attacks Migrants, Sparks Uproar, and Refuses to Apologize: “Ask Your Daughters”
Apple Challenges EU Digital Markets Act Crackdown in Landmark Court Battle
Shouting Match at the White House: 'Trump Cursed, Threw Maps, and Told Zelensky – "Putin Will Destroy You"'
‘No Kings’ Protests Inflate Numbers — But History Shows Nations Collapse Without Strong Executive Power
"The Tsunami Is Coming, and It’s Massive": The World’s Richest Man Unveils a New AI Vision
EU Moves to Use Frozen Russian Assets to Buy U.S. Weapons for Ukraine
Europe Emerges as the Biggest Casualty in U.S.-China Rare Earth Rivalry
“Firepower” Promised for Ukraine as NATO Ministers Meet — But U.S. Tomahawks Remain Undecided
The Sydney Sweeney and Jeans Storm: “The Outcome Surpassed Our Wildest Dreams”
Dutch Government Seizes Chipmaker After U.S. Presses for Removal of Chinese CEO
AI and Cybersecurity at Forefront as GITEX Global 2025 Kicks Off in Dubai
Ex-Microsoft Engineer Confirms Famous Windows XP Key Was Leaked Corporate License, Not a Hack
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary will not adopt the euro because the European Union is falling apart.
Mayor in western Germany in intensive care after stabbing
Australian government pays Deloitte nearly half a million dollars for a report built on fabricated quotes, fake citations, and AI-generated nonsense.
BYD’s UK Sales Soar Nearly Nine-Fold, Making Britain Its Biggest Market Outside China
Latvia to Bar Tourist and Occasional Buses to Russia and Belarus Until 2026
Wave of Complaints Against Apple Over iPhone 17 Pro’s Scratch Sensitivity
Munich Airport Reopens After Second Drone Shutdown
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
U.S. Demands Brussels Scrutinize Digital Rules to Prevent Bias Against American Tech
Private Equity’s Fundraising Surge Triggers Concern of European Market Shake-Out
Tokyo’s Jimbōchō Named World’s Coolest Neighbourhood for 2025
European Officials Fear Trump May Shift Blame for Ukraine War onto EU
The Personality Rights Challenge in India’s AI Era
Italy Considers Freezing Retirement Age at 67 to Avert Scheduled Hike
Italian City to Impose Tax on Visiting Dogs Starting in 2026
Study Finds No Safe Level of Alcohol for Dementia Risk
Trump Says Ukraine Can Fully Restore Borders with NATO Backing
Europe Signals Stronger Support for Taiwan at Major Taipei Defence Show
Germany Weighs Excluding France from Key European Fighter Jet Programme
Cyberattack Disrupts Check-in and Boarding Systems at Major European Airports
Björn Borg Breaks Silence: Memoir Reveals Addiction, Shame and Cancer Battle
When Extremism Hijacks Idealism: How the Baader-Meinhof Gang Emerged and Fell
JWST Data Brings TRAPPIST-1e Closer to Earth-Like Habitability
Trump Orders $100,000 Fee on H-1B Visas and Launches ‘Gold Card’ Immigration Pathway
France’s Looming Budget Crisis and Political Fracture Raise Fears of Becoming Europe’s “Sick Man”
Three Russian MiG-31 Jets Breach Estonian Airspace in ‘Unprecedentedly Brazen’ NATO Incident
European manufacturers against ban on polluting cars: "The industry may collapse"
Turkish car manufacturer Togg Enters German Market with 5-Star Electric Sedan and SUV to Challenge European EV Brands
Christian Brueckner Released from German Prison after Serving Unrelated Sentence
×