A stakeholder in the financial sector, Dr. Godwin Okeh, has urged commercial banks to fill the gaps in the digital payment systems to avoid cash out attacks by cyber criminals.
He explained that cash-out attack is a means through which cyber criminals use a bank or payment card processor or cloned cards at cash machines to potentially withdraw millions of naira within few hours.
Dr. Okeh, an economist by training, and a lecturer at the Federal University, Wukari, Taraba State, made the call in Port Harcourt on Monday while interacting with The Tide.
He explained that cyber criminals usually install malware on bank’s debit card payment system, saying such access card information removes fraud controls such as maximum withdrawal amount and exploits unlimited network access.
He noted that the network based attack was the new technique used by cyber criminals to cash money from the ATM securely and efficiently.
“The cyber criminals study the banks they plan to attack for several months before executing the fraud. They usually target debit, credit and prepaid cards”, he said.
According to him, successful incidents of ATM cash-out attacks usually led to significant loss of millions of naira on the part of the banks.
Okeh maintained that most of the cards used for cash-out attacks were valid cards, pointing out that 80 percent of the banks that were victims did not follow the 12 payment card industry requirements which, he said, would have prevented them from being attacked.
He said that the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard applies to companies that accept credit card payment.
“Banks should not allow cyber criminals to know the gaps in their payment systems. The banks need to do a thorough gap analysis to avoid such attack.