Nearly 300 customers of Republic Bank Guyana Limited have been reimbursed in excess of $20 million following a series of fraudulent activities on its VISA International Debit Cards.
Dr Gobind Ganga, Governor of the Bank of Guyana, explained to Stabroek News yesterday that Republic Bank has been providing the central bank with updates on the situation with the last update received less than two weeks ago.
“They indicated that 294 customers have been reimbursed more than $20 million,” he said, adding that the Bank is also working with Visa International to use a series of real-time decline rules to protect against fraudulent transactions.
On May 15th, the bank said that through its “robust monitoring systems,” it was able to quickly identify cases where customers’ cards were compromised and to effectively minimise the risk to other customers.
“The Bank is taking the necessary steps to regularise all affected accounts using a well-defined, standard process, focused on reducing customer inconvenience. The Bank regrets the inconvenience to its customers and advises that impacted customers will be asked to confirm and validate their transactions to assist with this process,” the bank’s statement added.
One month later the bank urged customers to vigilantly monitor their accounts even as it worked to find a permanent solution to a recent spate of “Brute-Force” attacks which resulted in fraudulent transactions through its international VISA OneCard.
In a statement issued on June 21, the bank explained that the attack is a trial-and-error method used by fraudsters to obtain, within seconds, payment card information, such as an account number and card expiration date.
Earlier this month the Trinidadian Branches were hit with a technological problem affecting its customer transactions, including mobile and Internet banking.
“Once that information is obtained, the fraudsters attempt numerous transactions at online merchants globally,” the statement said, before adding that “while many of these attempts failed, some were also authorised resulting in customers’ accounts being debited.”
The bank further explained that in order to reduce the opportunity for fraudsters to continue the attack, Republic Bank in collaboration with VISA implemented additional authorising measures that have resulted in some legitimate online transactions being blocked.
Customers who are having difficulty in attempting online transactions using their VISA OneCard were advised to contact Customer Support at 1-800-271-4725 or 1-868-625-1200.
The numbers are not toll free, therefore customers will be required to pay the costs associated with this measure. The company did not indicate if there will be any reimbursement, stating only that “efforts are being made to obtain a toll free number in the shortest possible time frame.”
Two months later the bank remains silent on the way forward and according to its latest report to the BoG the number is still not toll free.
In fact, according to Ganga, Republic Bank is still working with an unnamed telecommunications provider to “finalise a contract for a toll free number”.
