”Some money” was taken from Standard Bank clients when hackers gained access to the bank’s accounts, group spokesperson Ross Linstrom said on Wednesday.
”There has been some money [taken] but very little. That is not our concern. Our concern is tightening up [security]. In terms of people, it is less than ten,” Linstrom said.
He said these were isolated incidents.
Herman Singh, the bank’s director of architecture and technology engineering, said: ”There is no evidence of an organised syndicate being involved in these incidents.”
”… it would seem that the customer’s personal credentials have been compromised to somebody that they may know. Customers should be vigilant, and not share their personal credentials with anybody, be this wittingly or unwittingly,” he said.
However, Linstrom confirmed that several customers had reported suspicious prepaid transfers on their accounts and funds were transferred to a prepaid cellphone account.
”A Standard Bank internet security team physically examined several customers’ computers and found no malicious software,” he said, adding the probe into the incidents was ”ongoing”.
On Tuesday it was reported that hackers had gained access to the accounts of clients of all three major banks.
The newspaper’s website said hackers had in the past three months gained access to the online accounts of First National Bank, Standard and Absa bank clients, stealing thousands of rands.
The hackers had found a way of gaining access into personal or business accounts and then transferring money from these accounts to either cellphone or Telkom prepaid accounts.
All three banks confirmed on Monday that their systems had been breached.
Last week a hacker gained access to the account of Boaz Chilala, a First National Bank (FNB) client and stole R10 500.
FNB declined to say whether the money taken from Chilala’s bank account had been transferred into a cellphone prepaid account.
Chris Kotze, spokesperson for FNB Online, said Chilala would be reimbursed.
FNB and Absa bank officials could not immediately respond to queries on the matter. – Sapa