Keynote Speech by Minister Edwin Tong SC, Minister for Law and Second Minister for Home Affairs, at the 30th Annual Conference and General Meeting of the International Association of Prosecutors
Mr Lucien Wong, Attorney-General of Singapore,
Mr Juan Bautista Mahiques, President of the International Association of Prosecutors,
Mr Roel Dona, Secretary-General of the International Association of Prosecutors,
Attorneys General,
Prosecutors General,
Many Distinguished Guests.
Introduction
1. A very good morning to all of you.
2. And to all of those who have joined us from overseas, an especially warm welcome to Singapore. I know the weather is warm, but I hope our hospitality is even warmer.
3. I am very honoured to be invited this morning to deliver the keynote speech for the 30th Annual Conference and General Meeting of the International Association of Prosecutors (IAP 2025).
4. The IAP is a very important platform for prosecutors. It has grown to have immense global reach; provides thought leadership on best practices and guidelines; and most importantly, I believe, it brings together prosecutors across different legal systems who engage in the common endeavour of criminal justice.
5. Yesterday, our President - President Tharman - spoke about the challenges of a fractured world. He mentioned a global decrease in trust in public institutions; the ebbing of the international rules-based order; and a loss of faith in multilateralism, as countries begin to turn inwards.
6. These are all very important global considerations, and they undermine trust in institutions and overall lead to a decline in the efficiency of the criminal justice system.
7. But there is another major development, which I would like to speak about this morning, and that is the proliferation of online crimes and the rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI).
(a) Both of these twin factors have a significant impact on the way in which we apprehend criminals, and the way in which we organise our efforts around criminal justice systems.
(b) And taken together, these two shifts coalesce in what I regard as unprecedented challenges for prosecutors and criminal justice systems around the world.
8. In my address this morning, I will outline very briefly why these challenges will require prosecutors:
(a) to be versatile – even more versatile than before;
(b) to focus beyond the traditional skills of courtcraft; and
(c) to adopt a very multi-dimensional and multi-disciplinary, innovative mindset in collaboration with international partners, policymakers and other stakeholders, as we design the international criminal justice system.
Global crime trends
9. Let me start with an observation.
10. For the most part, we appear to have gotten better at dealing with physical crimes globally. If you take the Gallup 2024 Global Safety Report, it noted that on a global level, “people felt safer in 2023 than they did a decade ago”. And on average, 70% of adults globally said that they felt safe walking alone at night.
11. This figure is higher in countries such as Singapore, at 94%, which are supported by robust law enforcement, and undergirded by a very strong rule of law and criminal justice system.
12. But this sense of security has not translated as well, or equally, to the online sphere. We are witnessing a global proliferation in financial crimes, such as scams, money laundering and securities fraud.
(a) You take the NASDAQ Global Financial Crime Report 2024. It estimates fraud losses totalling at US$485.6 billion globally in 2023.
(b) INTERPOL estimates that around US$2 – 3 trillion of illicit proceeds are channelled through the global financial system annually.
13. The impact of such crimes is a lot more profound for financial hubs with a high level of digital connectivity, like Singapore.
14. The Singapore Police Force’s (SPF) Annual Scams and Cybercrime Brief noted that there were 51,101 scam cases, with at least S$1.1 billion lost in 2024. SPF also recently reported that in the first half of 2025, S$456.4 million was lost in Singapore to scams. That includes investment scams, impersonation scams and, increasingly, phishing scams as well.
15. And because we live in an interconnected world, online crimes spill over to the real world in tangible ways. For example, the proceeds of online crimes are often funnelled into other serious criminal activity such as drug trafficking, human trafficking by transnational criminal syndicates.
16. The Interpol has also warned of a global crisis in human trafficking-fuelled scam centres, where hundreds of thousands of human trafficking victims are detained in compounds, and forced to carry out online scams.
Technological developments
17. These crime trends converge with a time of intense technological developments, including the rise of AI.
18. Generative AI apps such as ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot – we use them every day, they are somewhat innocuous in the way in which they support the work that we do. But they also very quickly allow users to easily generate multimodal content such as text, images and videos.
19. With future advancements such as Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) and quantum computing, they promise to revolutionise work and opportunities in many ways. They help the public, they help society.
20. But these technologies also dramatically lower the barriers to entry for crime. Using these tools, criminals can very easily create a convincing phishing email with the style and tonality of your own colleagues, of government agencies, of persons in authority. A deepfake voice message with perfect inflections that sounds exactly like your closest loved ones. All just a prompt away using a generative AI app.
21. Criminals are already adopting such technologies in their operations. Earlier this year, the SPF collaborated with police forces from Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia and Thailand in an operation against online child sexual exploitation.
22. This operation was successful. It resulted in 435 arrests, with officers seizing child sexual abuse materials, including many created using Generative AI tools.
23. SPF observed that the distribution of child sexual abuse materials has become faster, more widespread, harder to trace, because they are increasingly anonymous, with the rapid evolution of technology.
24. In Singapore, the Cyber Security Agency (CSA) disclosed that around 13 percent of scams analysed in 2023 were very likely generated by AI.
25. We believe that that figure will only grow with greater adoption of AI, as Generative AI becomes more sophisticated, and technologies amplify themselves and evolve.
26. At the same time, technology also amplifies the scale. So, it is not just the ingenuity and novelty of types of crimes created and the modality by which they are created, but it is also the amplification of the scale of criminal offending beyond borders.
27. Some in this audience might be familiar with the case of Alexander McCartney in the UK.
(a) McCartney was a sexual predator living in Northern Ireland. He preyed on children and teenagers on social media platforms such as Snapchat, Instagram and Omegle.
(b) He befriended victims, pretended to be a girl of similar age and encouraged them to send indecent images or engage in sexual activity via webcam. Thereafter, he would blackmail victims using the images and the videos he obtained.
(c) Overall, McCartney is estimated to have targeted 3,500 children worldwide in the UK, in America, in New Zealand, and in at least 28 other countries.
(d) He admitted to 185 charges and was convicted for offences involving 70 child victims, including manslaughter after a 12-year-old in America committed suicide after McCartney tried to coerce her to involve her younger sibling in the sexual abuse.
28. This one case is just a microcosm, or an example, of the kind of challenges that we face – a single offender, through technology, is now able to target approximately 3,500 victims across 30 countries quite easily through technology, sitting in one location. His actions, through the internet, can even compel a young victim to commit suicide.
29. I am sure many of you will come across many other examples of similar genre. We cannot just sit back and hope to resolve these challenges through isolated efforts.
Solutions moving forward
30. What I believe these challenges tell us is that they require prosecutors to no longer adopt traditional roles but to be versatile, and as I said earlier, adopt a multi-disciplinary and a very innovative mindset, both individually and I believe, perhaps more importantly, collectively – through collaborations and international partnerships.
31. Beyond focusing on courtcraft, prosecutors also need to be adept with technology and AI, necessarily; build on international partnerships and cooperation; and collaborate closely with policymakers and the many other stakeholders in the criminal justice system.
32. Let me elaborate a little bit on this.
33. First, we need to not just deal with or accept that technology is here to stay. I think we need to adopt an embracement mindset. We need to embrace technology and AI, to ensure that downstream responses remain effective.
34. This entails keeping abreast of technological developments, to understand how they facilitate crime, and integrate technology in our own workflows to enhance productivity and legal service delivery.
35. In Singapore, for example,
(a) AGC’s Legal Tech Innovation Office works closely with its Crime Division to develop as well as adopt AI products to assist its own prosecutorial work. It does so in-house to allow it to attenuate it to local context and local needs.
(b) Officers have developed an in-house AI Judgment Summariser to generate case summaries.
(c) Prototypes of AI products are also being worked on, which may be able to assist our prosecutors in generating preliminary versions of legal documents such as statements of facts, submissions, and so on.
36. Second, I think it is critical in these times where crimes are no longer single jurisdiction-based to ensure that we have a broad outlook and that we embrace international partnerships. Particularly when at a time when the world is turning inwards, I believe that prosecutors around the world need to be looking outwards – looking at cooperation and collaboration, in order to effectively combat cross-border crime.
37. I gave some examples earlier. But let me just say that in a world where the barriers to entry for crime are getting lower and lower by the day, fuelled by AI, by technology, we really cannot afford to build walls around our own enforcement efforts and our own systems, within each jurisdiction.
38. I believe that collaboration can take multiple forms:
(a) For example, this conference, such as what we are having today, can help forge connections and facilitate the sharing of best practices between prosecution services around the world;
(b) They can also extend to bilateral agreements, to strengthen formal partnerships; or
(c) Mutual legal assistance, including the sharing of information to facilitate investigations and prosecutions across borders.
39. Increasingly, prosecutors also need to work closely with policymakers and other criminal justice stakeholders to share their valuable experience and expertise from practice, and to help find effective legal and policy solutions. To go upstream, to look at the cause and nature of the crime; and to go downstream, to look at what we can do, for example, in the space of rehabilitation.
40. Some other examples: stakeholders can give us very good feedback on laws and policies because these policies and laws impact them; and as they experience them, they can give us views on which areas might require reform.
(a) In Singapore, AGC’s Policy and Advisory Unit works closely with the Ministry of Law and the Ministry of Home Affairs on law reform to improve our criminal justice system.
(b) AGC and the Ministries collaborated closely in developing the recent Anti-Money Laundering and Other Matters Act.
i. The Government moved to strengthen prosecutorial capabilities and processes. We had to do so because we were told of evolving trends. We understood the landscape, and we wanted to better equip our prosecutors.
ii. We also allowed our prosecutors to deal with properties linked to suspected criminal activities, following feedback from stakeholders, including AGC.
41. Overall, addressing crimes require a whole-of-society effort. It is not just prosecutors, it is not just government or policymakers, but it is also those who work in the social work space, for example. Multiple stakeholders, including prosecutors, joining in, collaborating, sharing ideas on wider non-legislative initiatives as well.
42. To give one more example, the Sentencing Advisory Panel (SAP), which we set up some time ago, issues non-binding guidelines on sentencing matters. The SAP has representatives from the Prosecution, the Bar, the Judiciary, as well as the Ministry of Law and the Ministry of Home Affairs. So, the Bench, the Bar, stakeholders, users, policymakers.
43. And we consult widely, including social service workers as well, to understand the impact of sentencing and to come up with a framework to ensure that there is consistency where the facts are similar.
44. In this regard, the Prosecution’s contributions to the Panel have been crucial, to help the Panel promote greater consistency, adhere to systems and guidelines, promote transparency; and most importantly as well, public awareness in sentencing matters.
45. What is important is that we develop the criminal justice system and we come up with sentencing frameworks and principles that have the buy-in of the public, that public is aware of and can support.
46. So going back to the theme of this year’s conference, which I mentioned at the start: the versatile prosecutor and the administration of criminal justice.
47. The prosecutor is that vital piece in the puzzle – the one that sits in the middle, that aggregates and synthesises all the information that you receive, connecting the many parts that make a criminal justice system work well.
48. As that puzzle becomes more and more complex, which it will, as we confront the challenges of a fractured global order and tech-enabled transnational crime, it becomes increasingly clear that the role of the prosecutor must evolve correspondingly.
49. I have earlier put together some examples which I hope will give you some food for thought on how prosecutors can innovate and adapt – in both how you work and also with whom you work. How you can contribute to the broader administration of criminal justice both domestically as well as across international borders.
Conclusion
50. Finally, as I wrap up, let me just say that I am so encouraged by the presence of so many of you here today, coming from different parts of the world and indeed, as I said earlier, not just different legal systems, but different cultural backgrounds and contexts.
51. I think that is important, because this sharing of information across those divides will help us to strengthen ourselves, will help us to become stronger than the sum of our parts, will help us to think about what we might be able to adopt as best practices in our own jurisdictions.
52. On that score, I am confident that the IAP will continue to help facilitate the sharing of immensely valuable insights, foster important partnerships, to better enable us to effectively deal with the challenges ahead, for which I believe there are many.
53. Thank you very much for listening this morning. I wish all of you a very fruitful and productive conference ahead.
54. Thank you.
Last updated on 8 September 2025