25 April,2011 07:34 AM IST | | Shashank Shekhar
South Delhi resident has lodged an FIR against the financial institution
If you feel your money is safe with a bank, think again. Swami Nagar resident Shabad Sarup Bhatia, who holds an account with a private bank for the last 11 years, had the unhappy experience of Rs 90,000 being siphoned off from his account.
Representative pic
Bhatia said: "On April 5, 2011 I received an SMS at 3:20 pm which said, 'Dear customer your account security update is going on in few minutes you will get your registration number. Please register your number to Mamleswar Pandey 09702475195 for account security.'
A little later I received a call from Mamleswar Pandey from the same number. He mentioned he was from the bank's head office in Mumbai and would be updating the security of the account. Soon after, I received another SMS at 3.23 pm from the bank saying, 'Mamleswar K Pandey is added as payee for fund transfer from your Internet Banking account. Confirm with URN 951140. If you did not add payee, call now to report as fraud.' Before I could understand anything I got the final SMS at 3.55 pm that said, 'Your account is debited Rs 90,000.00. Info: BILL'000217372511'Mamle-swar. Total available balance Rs 236.69.' I was shocked."
Jolt to a stop
Bhatia then went to the bank's Rohini branch and lodged a complaint of fraud and got his account frozen and cancelled all his cards. "The bank lodged the complaint (Sr No. - SR172835031) and asked me to get an FIR registered for the same. They provided me with more information like the account in which the money was transferred is 054401001897, name of the account owner is Mamleswar Pandey and area is Bandra in Mumbai," he added.
The victim then went to Connaught Place Police Station and got an FIR lodged as the bank is registered in that area. "Bank representatives said they have never sent me any mail or SMS and the account in which the money was transferred is with the same bank. So they have been monitoring it and as soon any transaction is made they will take the money from the account," Bhatia said.
A senior official of Rohini branch of the bank said, "Yes we have received the complaint and it seems like a case of cyber crime. Our investigation department is looking into the matter. We are also tracing the details of the account holder."
Stay safe
"We have been educating and informing our customers that we don't ask for any details over the mail or phone. If a client feels suspicious about something, he/she can inform us on our customer care number," he added.
Cyber crime experts say criminals are getting smarter by the day and are coming up with newer ways to dupe people.
"Cyber criminals may look or sound so professional that it becomes hard to identify them. But if the customer is a little careful, he can easily tell the difference. For any banking related issues I would suggest a visit to the nearest branch. There have been cases where bank officials were seen working with criminals by passing on details, so one needs to be extra careful," said Sunny Vaghela, cyber crime expert and owner of Techdefence.
'National panel needed to tackle cyber crime'
Cyber crime is a major area of concern for corporates, industry experts said at a function earlier this month and called for creating a national-level agency to evolve a fine balance between cyber data protection and privacy of individuals. "Cyber secrecy and network security are extremely relevant in today's context," said Pawan Duggal, chairman of Assocham's cyber law committee. "Both the requirements of national sovereign government as those of balancing the needs of data protection and privacy have to be appropriately addressed," he added.
He also emphasised the need to ensure that relevant stake-holders are not burdened with costs of compliance in a manner that makes it difficult for them to run a business.
