The Singapore Police Force Scholarship and MHA Scholarships Award Ceremony 2026 - Speech by Mr K Shanmugam, Senior Minister, Coordinating Minister for National Security and Minister for Home Affairs

Chairman of the Public Service Commission, Mr Lee Tzu Yang

Public Service Commission Members

Scholarship recipients, educators, families

Home Team colleagues

Introduction

1. Very good evening to all of you.

2. First of all, congratulations to all our scholarship recipients, and their parents who are here.

3. Tonight marks the start of your journey with the Home Team.

4. Our mission – the Home Team’s mission – is very clear, very simple: to keep Singapore safe and secure. And within that, there are so many departments, many different facets.

5. You know, if you look at international rankings, reports, surveys, Gallup’s 2025 Global Safety Report, we were ranked the safest city in the world 12 times.

6. These things don’t happen by coincidence or chance. The latest Public Perception Survey by the Home Team – we go on the ground, we ask Singaporeans – about 95% of those surveyed gave a very good rating for the Home Team’s performance in keeping Singapore safe and secure.

7. And everyone here – you think back – first of all, you wouldn’t have had, unlike many other countries, you wouldn’t have had much to do with the Police because crime is low. Second, your impression of the Police Force and your impression of your own safety – I think you can relate to what I’m saying.

8. About 93% trusted our officers to carry out their duties professionally, fairly, and with integrity. So, whichever part of the Home Team you are joining, you are joining an organisation that has tremendous reservoir of goodwill and trust. That is not easy to find. So, whether you are joining the Police, or SCDF, or ICA, or Internal Security Department, or Prisons, or CNB, any of the others – automatically, public perception of you as a member of this team is that you have personal integrity, that they can trust you, and they rely on you to keep Singapore and themselves safe – not many organisations where you join and automatically come with that certificate of trust; but it has to be earned regularly, and you will then have to work to make sure that it’s maintained.  These are all the results of hard work over the years by generations of Home Team officers.

Internet-Enabled Crime

9. I want to spend a little bit of time talking to you about the kind of challenges that we face in Singapore on the law and order front, so that you also know what we are grappling with, dealing with. It is important when you come back each year, you will be in the organisation – you need an understanding of how things are changing.

10. We have done very well in Singapore on physical crime – housebreaking, sexual crimes, homicides – homicide is hardly, you know, something that is present in people’s minds. So, on the physical side, it’s been as safe as one can possibly think of.

11. One threat has been rising very fast, and we have been trying to put a lot of resources into it: this is crime committed through the internet.

12. Scams, they target our psychology – they take advantage of human nature and emotions.

13. Scammers reach out to potential victims, they hide behind anonymity and they move stolen funds quickly.

14. And part of the reason, the very same fact that people in Singapore have a tremendous trust in the Home Team, in Government as a whole, they believe Singapore to be safe and secure – this also means that when somebody calls up and says they are from the Police, or from IRAS, or one of the Government agencies and asks for phone number, banking details, particularly older people – so it’s very sad to see.

15. I see couples in their 60s, often in their 70s too – entire life savings of few hundred thousands  gone in a minute because somebody with a card tells them I’m from the Police force, I’m from one of these agencies, and we need your bank account because something is happening, and they will give, and then $500,000 is gone, no money left. It’s very sad to see.

16. Some of them, they are in Singapore, we can deal with them, but often the money is transferred overseas. So, very quickly, within a matter of seconds, it’s outside the jurisdiction, and of course once the money leaves, it’s very difficult to recover.

17. There are too many stories of people losing their entire life savings.

18. We have come up with a slew of legislation to deal with scams.

19. Last year, for the first time, we saw a drop in the number of scam cases and the total amount that was lost to scams.

20. But it is really too early to tell –  we don’t know which way it’s going because technology is changing.

New Threat – Artificial Intelligence

21. In the context of the Internet, we now face a very new and powerful threat: Artificial Intelligence, or AI.

22. It is changing the threat landscape in many different ways.

23. It lowers the barriers to entry. Previously, it would take years to learn something. Now, with the right prompt, it can be  done in a matter of minutes.

24. It compresses the time between the intent to commit a crime and the actual commission of the crime.

25. Days of planning now takes minutes, and it meansis less time for the Police Force, for the law enforcement agencies, to detect, let alone prevent.

26. And, AI is developing rapidly.  Many newer and more powerful models are coming up, even this year, six months is too outdated in the AI world. We are seeing the impact of the AI threats .

27. For example, take extremism. We detained a 17-year-old boy under the Internal Security Act two years ago.

28. He had used an AI chatbot to generate his pledge of allegiance to ISIS and his attack manifesto.

29. Last year, we detained another 17-year-old boy.

30. He had searched an AI chatbot for instructions on producing ammunition and 3D printing of firearms.

31. Another example: scams. Take a look at this video.

32. You know, sounds very real. If you look at it carefully enough, you can pick it up, but it sounds very real. One victim lost nearly 5 million dollars, because they thought the Singapore government was making an appeal for money, and scammers then contacted the gentleman and said, “You know, government doesn’t need the money for itself, but it needs the money to use for international purposes”, as said in this video. And, he put up 4.9 million dollars, and so did many others. So, it’s all around us. It’s increasing, and I’m sure the AI videos will get better than this.

33. A third example is misinformation and disinformation.

34. Two years ago, there was a stabbing attack in Southport, England. Three young girls were killed.

35. Within hours, a post on X made a false claim: It said the suspect was a Muslim immigrant. AI-generated images made the falsehood appear more credible.

36. Within days, riots all over the UK; mosques were attacked; asylum seekers were targeted. A lot of violence, a lot of action, and the entire country was in a terrible state of crisis.

37. Back in Singapore, this year, we very recently detected over 30 YouTube channels, which published nearly 300  AI-generated videos in Mandarin – targeting PM Lawrence; there were false claims that the Cabinet was fighting within itself, that Singapore was facing economic collapse and so on.

38. Two months ago, we saw online posts targeting the Indian community with inflammatory narratives. So, people are also targeting Singapore, our unity within Singapore, and using AI.

How the Home Team Stays Ahead

39. How do we deal with all of this? This is just a small vignette of the kind of challenges that we now face. The physical landscape remains under control, it does not mean that there is no crime, nor does it not mean we can relax. It only remains in control because we keep it under control. So, it is a continuous work in progress. On top of it is this AI-induced, internet-enabled crime that is exploding. 

40. We need strong governance. I mentioned this in the context of scams earlier.

41. We have targeted this with a number of laws, so that the legal framework is strong; peculiar to Singapore because most of the countries that are facing these threats are not in a position to put in place the right legal framework. So, we have Maintenance of Religious Harmony Act, Racial Harmony Act, Foreign Interference Countermeasures Act -  all giving the Government, particularly, the Ministry of Home Affairs, powers to move in quickly, disable, take down, and based on credible information, we will arrest without hesitation .

42. These are designed to stop the harm before it becomes worse.

43. Second, we are working on turning AI's capabilities to our advantage.

44. So, across the Home Team, we are trying to use AI to detect threats earlier, to make our officers more efficient and effective, and free our officers from tasks that require human judgment, so that they don’t handle the routine stuff.

45. For example, the SPF has launched Cyber Command. We have a Digital Disruption Centre which identifies and removes online threats. Now, AI is not quite where we want it to be – it is work in progress, but we are trying. So, what we will try to do is to try and remove the fake websites, or disrupt them even before they can be deployed. Two in three such sites are now being taken down.

46. Look at ICA – it  is transforming border clearance. The Automated Passenger Clearance System at the checkpoints uses biometrics, counter-forgery capabilities, and passengers are cleared while sitting in their vehicles.

47. What that means is one officer can oversee several lanes at the same time.

48. ICA is also deploying AI in document processing. Together with HTX, which is our science and technology agency that cuts across Home Team, a product, was developed called Matrix, that improves the accuracy of data extraction by a factor of  three.

49. Other Home Team agencies are also moving in the same direction.

50. CNB is using AI, like Police, to speed up investigative processes.

51. SCDF uses AI to identify buildings which are more likely to have fire safety violations, so that officers can target the buildings which have higher risk.

52. Prisons is trialling an Autonomous Tele-visit System, that can automate registration, verify identities, detect who is unauthorised in terms of visitors and activities, and also try and flag signs of emotional distress. And it can do so in real-time.

53. The key agency behind all of this is HTX.

54. We launched the Home Team AI Movement two years ago.

55. In April this year, I announced that HTX, in collaboration with partners, has built a product called NGINE. This is MHA's first sovereign, GPU-powered, sovereign AI infrastructure.

56. In collaboration with other partners, HTX has also released our Phoenix family of large language models. They are currently being used by our Home Team officers.

57. This is the operating reality now. We have to keep re-inventing ourselves.

People at the Heart of our Mission

58. But all of this is made possible because we push new boundaries, while holding on to what is fundamental. The work that the Home Team, the work that you all will be doing, demands good judgment, a good moral judgment, – it demands experience, it requires empathy, and it requires courage – especially during crises.

59. In the end, it is humans, people, who decide what matters, what is fair, and what has to be done.

60. This is why the scholarships schemes remain vital for Home Team to continue to do well.

61. Our success as Home Team, success of Singapore, depends on officers who have good judgment, who have commitment and act with a sense of purpose.

62. So, we have to attract and develop the very best minds.

63. And we require our scholarship recipients to demonstrate not only academic excellence, but also leadership, and most importantly, a deep commitment to public service.

64. Today, we have 40 scholarship recipients. We welcome each one of you.

65. I will make mention of Charlene who is our very first female President's Scholar.

66. What can you look forward to – each one of you? High standards will be set for you, because to maintain public trust, we have to set high standards, we want our people to do their best work.

67. It shows in a number of ways. For example, when surveys are done on working environment, Home Team agencies do well – Straits Times’ Singapore's Best Employers rankings last year – Home Team agencies have been named employers of choice.

68. We are also positioned as one of the top two Singapore government organisations to work for on Glassdoor.

69. Within the Public Service, in the rankings on organisations to work for, more than half of our agencies were recognised as Public Service High Engagement Agencies.

70. You are joining an organisation that will invest in you, and help you reach your fullest potential, provided you do your part.

Conclusion

71. There will be challenges.

72. But we will keep Singapore safe and secure with strong governance, responsible use of technology and continued investment in the right people.

73. So, to the families, teachers, and the mentors here today: Thank you for nurturing these very promising young people.

74. To the scholarship recipients: The future is yours to shape. Welcome, once again, to the Home Team.

75. Thank you.