Beware
of your Bank Account Information theft
By
Maxwell Pereira
mfjpkamath@gmail.com
Politicians
and bureaucrats in India are required as per rules in the normal
course to declare their assets to the government. No one has however
thought of monitoring their bank accounts. I am not sure whether
perhaps this has something to do with an individual's privacy
rights. But while investigating cases of disproportionate assets
it is not uncommon for CBI to come across a plethora of multiple
accounts being operated by the officer/individual under investigation
in a cross-section of different banks, in own name, in the name
of wife, children or other family members, or benami - in an effort
to distribute, hide or confuse the ready availability of details
or knowledge concerning fortunes amassed.
In
this context a recent unexpected development in England may interest
the mandarins in our finance and home ministries and the vigilance
conscience keepers elsewhere, to alert them to possibilities here
- for both checks and balances on one hand, and threats of blackmail
or identity cloning/ false identities on the other.
The
website http://www.thisislondon.co.uk
has an interesting article on how a burglar last week has stolen
bank account details of more than 15,000 Scotland
Yard officers following a huge security blunder.
Sensitive
financial information about high-ranking officers - said to include
Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair, and anti-terrorist
detectives that were stored on three laptops stolen from the company
responsible for the force's pay and pensions services, is feared
to have fallen into the hands of the burglars. A major security
review was then ordered at Britain's biggest force amid fears
the thief could steal vast sums of money from officers' accounts.
It is also feared the computer files - which includes National
Insurance numbers - could be used by criminal gangs to create
false identities.
The
break-in, at the offices of software group LogicaCMG in Peckham,
South-East London, is a huge embarrassment to Scotland Yard. Horrified
over the fact
that the company did not have better security, senior Yard officers
are said to be clamouring for heads to roll over this, saying
it is absolutely scandalous that a thief can steal such sensitive
information at a time of unprecedented concerns over security.
The security implications of this are feared to be terrifying,
as the potential for identity cloning is vast.
Detectives
in the meantime are trying to establish whether the thief had
deliberately targeted the offices in Southwark Street, Peckham,
which are thought to have been fitted with state-of-the-art security
because of the company's sensitive work for the Metropolitan Police.
They are trying to establish whether it was working properly when
the thief - or thieves - broke in.
The
police chief is said to be 'furious' about the security breach
and has demanded a report on the circumstances of the burglary.
Payroll details of at least half of the Met's 30,000 police officers
were on the stolen laptops. It is thought that sensitive information
about several thousand civilian staff were also on the computers,
which have not been recovered.
LogicaCMG
and its pension administrator partner Paymaster have a 31million
seven-year contract awarded last year to provide a payroll and
pensions administration service for the Metropolitan Police's
46,000 officers and civilian staff. A risk assessment done following
the burglary in respect of the data on the laptops has concluded
that the risk of staff members falling victim to either
fraudulent activity or identity theft is minimal, as the laptops
did not contain home addresses or telephone numbers of staff,
and there was no suggestion that terrorists were responsible for
the raid. LogicaCMG has of course offered the commissioner an
unreserved apology. A spokesperson of the company has assured
that immediate action has been taken to mitigate any further risk
arising
from this incident and are cooperating fully with the Metropolitan
Police investigation.
Coming
closer home, people in India are strangely less security conscious,
and less alive to the harmful possibilities or repercussions following
thefts of personal account information. In the context of recent
reports of phising attacks on many local banks and their clients
and constituents - including the UTI bank which handles the payrolls
of a 60,000 plus force accounts of Delhi Police, it would not
be out of place for those concerned - the bank authorities and
the police management, to spare a moment to the vital security
aspects involved.
In
the guise of protecting the constituent's interest, conmen are
busy with their 'phising' attacks emailing ostensibly from the
bank's own banner asking clients to confirm their "Account
Details To Avoid Service Suspension", or announcing the "New
Security Upgrade" etc for a better and secure banking service
against any fraudulent activities. With this façade the
account holder is conned into parting/ providing his account information
- asking him also to include his Transaction Id & password
by following the given reference. The reference* provided to UTI
Customers is
http://www.UTIbank.co.in/account.update.asp?ID=signonasp35bh53967hut763d
which the Delhi Police cyber cell would do well to investigate.
28.11.2006:
Copyright © Maxwell Pereira: 3725 Sector-23, Gurgaon-122017
Tel: 0124-4111026 & 2360568; website: http://www.
maxwellpereira.com; email: mfjpkamath@gmail.com
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