Mahesh Bank management had no proper cyber security: Anand

Hyderabad: City Police Commissioner CV Anand said on Thursday that they have made significant progress in the Mahesh Bank case wherein Rs. 12.9 crore was siphoned off by hackers by using bank servers.

He said "the bank's main server was hacked, and three accounts were used to transfer the money to more than 100 other bank accounts. We have found that the bank did not have a proper cyber security team in place for online banking to prevent such scam. A detailed investigation is being carried out into the fraud. We have obtained some clues and leads. But we cannot say, for now, whether the fraudster was operating locally or internationally."

He added, "the bank has accounts of citizens worth several crore; the management should have made efforts to safeguard public money and ensured that all necessary safety measures were in place to protect money, but the bank failed in doing so. Also, there is no proper safety mechanism for the bank's main server, due to which it was compromised and hacked."

"We have been able to freeze nearly Rs 3 crore which was transferred into various bank accounts till now. Details of those who opened bank accounts are being verified; will be able to crack the case at earliest. Previous investigations have revealed that money siphoned from the bank was transferred in to nearly 120 accounts in various parts in the country," noted the officer.

Cyber fraudsters hacked into the bank servers and logged into main accounts and transferred the amount a few days ago. Since then, the police are on their toes to trace them.