DBBL ATM Theft: 3 more foreigners involved

Three more foreigners were found involved in the recent Dutch Bangla Bank Limited’s (DBBL) ATM theft by an international hacker group, police said.

One of them is a Russian citizen and the rest are yet to be identified, an official of Detective Branch (DB) of police said.

The three withdrew money illegally from different ATM booths in Nikunja and Rampura area sometime between May 31 and June 4. 

The identified Russian is Vladislav Gritsenko, 34, according to his passport. On May 31, he came to Dhaka by a flight of Thai airways and checked in at Hotel Salimar in the capital’s Gulistan area, the DB official said.   

He left the hotel at 9:10pm on June 4 and departed the country by another Thai airways flight at 1:55am.  

Investigation Officers said the unidentified duo met the Russian man at his hotel on June 2.

On the very day, six Ukrainian nationals were arrested over the ATM forgery.

Another suspect Vitalii Klimchuk, 31, who allegedly escaped arrest, is still at large, police said.

According to investigators, the seven suspects landed in Dhaka on May 30 and stole money from an ATM booth in middle Badda the very next day.

Later in investigation, it came out that nine ATMs of DBBL had fallen prey to the international hacker group who stole around 16 lakh.

Two cases were filed in connection with the ATM theft.

In this method, the card was inserted in the ATM and the machines’ connection with the bank’s server got severed, after which the suspects just took money out, said DB sources, quoting an IT expert.