The Scorpions are questioning eight people in connection with an e-mail scam that targeted customers at South African banks last month, a Standard Bank spokesperson said on Wednesday.
Erik Larsen said the eight are all South Africans and that there have been no further attacks since the scam was exposed in late May.
”The suspects, all of whom are South Africans, are linked to the massive e-mail fraud scam that targeted the customers of various banks towards the end of last month,” he said.
”The breakthrough followed an intensive investigation by Standard Bank, which has been working closely with the Scorpions, both locally and internationally.”
The crime — dubbed ”phishing”, after fishing for information — occurs when an e-mail is sent to a bank’s client to lure the recipients to a clone of the bank’s website, which prompts them to reveal personal information.
Fraudulent e-mails can be recognised because they include attachments, requesting personal identification codes and passwords. The websites often contain grammatical errors.
Standard Bank’s investigations showed that the syndicate recruited ”runners” in South Africa to launder money, through their bank accounts, to an eastern European fraud syndicate.
The runners were often not aware that what they were doing was illegal.
Standard Bank said it shut down a phony internet site that had been set up by fraudsters to obtain its customers’ banking details.
Absa, First National Bank and Nedbank said their customers had also been targeted.
Banks have advised their customers to ignore any e-mails directing them to a website requesting personal details such as account numbers. — Sapa