Bankers accept blame for rising e-fraud

Operators of banks in the country have accepted culpability in the increasing rate of electronic fraud (e-fraud) in financial institutions.

The Deputy General Manager/Chief Inspector, Guaranty Trust Bank Plc, Mr. Segun Fadahunsi, said the unhealthy competition among banks gave way to rising cases of fraud.

According to him, in an effort to do business and keep customers, some banks do not cooperate or release information about their customers even when it is glaring that the customer has defrauded another bank.

Fadahunsi, who spoke at the first annual meeting of Nigeria e-Fraud Forum, NeFF, said some banks would prefer to sit on monies supposed to be refunded to other financial institutions for several months.

The banker advocated stronger regulation to compel banks play by the rules of banking.

He said: “NeFF is the convergence point to tackling e- fraud which is on the rise. The forum needs to look into the risk introduced by expanding payment systems.”

In the same vein, the Executive Director, Zenith Bank, Mr. Andy Ojei, said there was the need to evolve an adequate initiative that would check e-fraud now that electronic banking was thriving.

He said the e-banking channel for regulator, operators and customers was a win, win situation, adding that tackling e-fraud would make e-banking more appealing.

Ojei said that for the fight against e-fraud to achieve the desired result, all hands must be on deck.

However to reduce efraud to its barest minimum, the NeFF said it was working to develop a data base that would accommodate statistics on e-fraud, which would be ready in the first quarter of 2013.