EBL shuts down ATMs for 6 hours
The Eastern Bank Ltd yesterday shut down operations of all of its ATM booths for six hours, after 21 banking transactions were deemed suspicious.
Ziaul Karim, a spokesperson for the private bank, said the bank had suspended operations of its 200 ATM booths from 12:00pm to 6:00pm after some clients informed the bank's call centre about the suspected transactions.
"We had shut down the system as a precaution. However, our system went live again at 6:00pm," he told The Daily Star.
Quoting the complainants, the official said the clients told the call centre that they received short messages about the transactions on their mobile phones although they did not use their cards to withdraw money.
Ziaul said the suspected transactions were carried out not at EBL's own ATM booths, but at the booths of some other banks interconnected through the National Payment Switch.
The bank instantly informed the central bank, which operates the National Payment Switch.
The bank deactivated the 21 cards in question. "The cards will be reactivated after we find out whether the transactions were legal,” he said.
Customers who would turn out to be victims of the fraud need not worry about the money, as they will be refunded by the EBL, he added.
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