COMPANY COMMENT: Cybercrime keeps the banking ombud busy
Security has become a major issue and ATM-related complaints still top the list
There’s nothing like a new technological advance to stimulate the inventiveness of the cyber-criminal," says John Myburgh SC, who chairs the Ombudsman for Banking Services. The ever more sophisticated and widespread use of technology by banks and their customers, and by criminals, is one of the factors that has made internet banking the second-largest contributor to the ombud’s caseload. It accounts for 20%, with phishing, cellphone transactions and SIM-card swaps the main culprits.Security has become a major issue and not just when it comes to the internet or cellphone banking: ATM-related complaints still top the list of cases at the ombud, even though the numbers have come down somewhat in the latest year. Perhaps the most disturbing thing about the statistics is that more than half of the ombud’s cases were fraud-related, with most of those customers victims of scams, rather than of maladministration, which in the main are resolved in favour of the banks, not the customers. The ...
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