City Bank to take action against three staff if found guilty of ATM fraud

The City Bank says it will take action against three employees who have been arrested over the recent ATM fraud in Bangladesh if investigations find them guilty.

Police produced the three IT division staff of the private bank before the media on Monday after arresting them along with a foreign national in Dhaka a day earlier.

In a complaint filed with police on Feb 14, the United Commercial Bank said CCTV footage had shown a foreigner installing at an ATM booth a skimming device meant to steal account information.

The City Bank, too, filed a case over the ATM scam.

After going through the footage, police arrested Piotr Szcdepan Mazurek, a Ukrainian national who had come to Bangladesh with a Polish passport, and the three City Bank officials -- Moksed Ali Maksud, Rezaul Karim Shahin, and Refat Ahmed Rony

Asked if steps have already been taken against the three bank officials, City Bank CEO Sohail RK Hussain said, “Police have informed us about the arrests.”

“We are investigating the incident. The departments concerned have been directed to take stern action against whoever involved in the irregularity.

“Though the amount of money four of our clients have lost [in the scam] is small, we are taking this seriously,” he told bdnews24.com.

The fraudsters also robbed UCB and Eastern Bank Limited clients by cloning their ATM cards.

They installed the skimming devices in six ATM outlets of the three banks, the Bangladesh Bank has found.

Altogether, 1,200 transactions had taken place after the device installation. As many as 40 bank cards were cloned to withdraw Tk 2 million, according to media reports that cited police sources.