Government committed to bring to justice those involved in BB fund heist, says Finance Minister Muhith

Finance Minister Abul Mal Abdul Muhith has said that the government is committed to bring those involved in the Bangladesh Bank cyber heist to book.

The minister gave the statement in response to a tabled question in the Parliament on Monday.

Muhith is currently in Germany.

In response to a question from MP Nuruddin Chowdhury, the minister said that almost the entire amount routed to Sri Lanka by the hackers was already recovered while talks were on to recover the money transferred to the Philippines.

In February, hackers attempted to steal nearly $1 billion from Bangladesh’s account at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, according to Bangladesh Bank officials, investigating the theft.

The size of the transactions triggered concern, which led to the NY Fed blocking transfer of $20 million to a bank in Sri Lanka, but the hackers were able to move $81 million to some accounts in the Philippines.

Officials privy to the investigation said the criminals had used malicious code, known as malware, to penetrate its computers.

Finance Minister Muhith said that talks were on with the authorities in Philippines to bring back nearly $10 million that the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) in that country managed to recover so far.

The minister also said that after getting the final report from the investigating team, the government would analyse the report and then devise a mechanism to ward off such incidents in the future.