Islami Bank regains control of hacked Facebook page

The bank says its IT team worked with Meta to recover the page after repeated hacks

Islami Bank has regained control of its official Facebook page after it was taken over twice by hackers identifying themselves as “MS 470 X”.

The bank authorities confirmed the recovery of the page late on Friday night.

The profile picture now features Islami Bank’s logo, although the cover photo remains blank.

No new posts have been made on the page since its recovery, nor has the bank commented publicly on the hacking incidents.

Nazrul Islam, head of the bank’s public relations department, told bdnews24.com: “Our IT team has been in regular contact with Meta (Facebook). The page has been restored and is now under the bank’s control.

“It will take a bit more time before we officially announce full control.”

The page was first hacked early on Friday, then recovered by the bank around 4pm. About four and a half hours later, it was compromised again.

The hackers warned of launching cyberattacks on the bank’s website and Facebook page after the initial breach.

By noon, the page was inaccessible, but it appeared normal again by afternoon before being hacked a second time that night.

At 8:28pm, the hackers took control, changing both the profile and cover photos.

A minute later, they posted, “Page hacked?” Then at 8:32pm, another post followed saying: “Hello dear Islami Bank so-called experts.” Their final post came at 9:22pm.

In both incidents, the hackers identified themselves as “MS 470 X”.

The hackings took place amid significant organisational changes at Islami Bank following a recent political shift that freed the institution from control of the S Alam Group.

During the group’s tenure, around 10,000 people were reportedly hired without formal tests or verification, pushing the workforce from 13,500 in 2016 to 22,000.

On Sept 27, the bank called 5,385 of those verbally appointed employees to take an evaluation test, but only 414 appeared. Those who skipped the test were relieved of duty.

Hackers later posted a message on the bank’s page, demanding reinstatement of the dismissed employees before deleting it.

Their message read: “Due to the unethical and unjust actions of the current authorities of Bangladesh Islami Bank, MS 470 X has taken control of their page. The future of thousands of workers must be protected. An immediate review of the unfair dismissals should be declared.”