South African Standard Bank has been hit by an international Credit Card fraud of 300 million Rand.
The bank said the crime “involved the withdrawal of cash using a small number of fictitious cards at various ATMs in Japan”. The bank reported no financial losses for customers.
According to a Japanese News website, about ¥1.44 billion ($300 million) was illegally withdrawn with forged credit cards from 1,400 automated teller machines in convenience stores around the country
Police suspect that a group of more than 100 people extracted the money from the ATMs, which were located in Tokyo and 16 prefectures, over a period of about 2½ hours on May 15. May 15 was a Sunday and all the money was withdrawn over a period from a little past 5 a.m. to shortly before 8 a.m.
Each transaction involved the removal of ¥100,000, the maximum withdrawal limit set for ATMs, and there were more than 14,000 transactions in the case.
The Police is still investigating the matter.
