‘Freak transactions’ in Eastern Bank Limited force all its ATM booths to close for six hours

Some “freak transactions”, including withdrawal of money from the accounts of customers without their knowledge, have taken place in the Eastern Bank Limited (EBL).

Following the unusual development, all the ATM booths of the bank were shut down after 12pm on Friday.

They were reopened at around 6pm, EBL’s Head of Communications Ziaul Karim told bdnews24.com.

He could not say what exactly happened and how, but a senior official with the private bank, who did not want to be named, said, “Prima facie we suspect it is a case of cyber attack.”

Another EBL official said several hundred customers lost hundreds of thousands of takas in the past couple of days due to ghost transactions.

bdnews24.com journalist Mahbuba Akter Dina is among those who lost money.

“At 7:15am and 7:19am, I got two SMS notifications from the bank stating that Tk 80,000 has been withdrawn from my account through two transactions done at Mutual Trust Bank’s Shewraparha booth,” she said.

"But the card was with me. And no one else knows the pin," she said. 

“Finding it unusual, I called up EBL’s customer care department. They also confirmed the transactions,” she added.

When Dina explained the whole incident, they registered a complaint and promised to look into the matter.

But until evening, Dina did not get any “good news” by which time she had contacted the customer care executives twice.

Friday being a weekly holiday, she said could not also lodge a written complaint.

The bank continued to receive more such complaints of unauthorised withdrawals before it shut down all its ATM booths by noon.

Notices hung up outside the booths read: “Temporarily closed down due to technical problem.” 

Since the bank also blocked the National Payment System (NPS), no transaction could be made using EBL’s card at the booths of other banks.

On being asked when the booths would be functional again, Rezaul Karim, who supervises the EBL’s call centre, told bdnews24.com, “You can inquire once in the evening. But it may take more time.”

Ziaul Karim, the head of communications who confirmed transactions at the booths resuming after 6pm, said, “We are trying to find out how many customers were affected and track the booths from which transactions were made.

“We have informed the Bangladesh Bank of the matter.”

EBL officials said they got information about withdrawal of money from accounts of the customers using EBL’s cards from Trust, Jamuna, UCBL, and Dhaka Bank’s booths.

Bangladesh Bank’s spokesperson Shubhankar Saha told bdnews24.com, “We are not sure whether it is a cyber attack.”

The executive director of the central bank said, “The EBL has informed us about closing down of their ATM booths. Whatever financial losses customers will incur will be compensated by the bank.”