BoG monitoring Visa Card breaches at RBL Guyana – Governor

…says priority is to have affected customers reimbursed

The Bank of Guyana (BoG) is monitoring the recent fraudulent activities experienced by a significant number of Visa cardholders at Republic Bank (Guyana) Limited.
Over the past few weeks, several customers of Republic Bank in Guyana have complained about their Visa OneCard being used for fraudulent transactions with international merchants.
Last week, the commercial bank said in a notice that it was alerted by its monitoring systems about the unusual Visa OneCard activity at some global online merchants. The Visa OneCard is a debit card that can be used to access funds at ATMs, make electronic payments, and shop online.
“Based on the reports received, the Bank took immediate steps to block related sites to minimise the possibility of further fraudulent attempts,” it noted. Republic Bank also indicated that all fraudulent transactions, which have ranged from zero dollars to hundreds of thousands of dollars, will be reimbursed.
Contacted on Wednesday for a comment on the situation, Governor of the Bank of Guyana, Dr Gobind Ganga, told Guyana Times that the issue is being monitored. He explained that the breach did not occur at the commercial bank’s end, but at Visa – a global digital payment technology service provider.
“We continue to follow what is happening, and what, for example, Visa is doing, and what this bank is doing with respect to their interaction with Visa; and also to know what this bank is doing with its ongoing monitoring and the kind of restrictions that are being put in place, and some of the fraud management rules that they’re implementing. So, Central Bank is in continuous assessment of all of these,” he noted.
Local banks are required to report such breaches to the Central Bank, and according to Dr Ganga, Republic Bank had complied with this requirement. However, the Governor related that while the commercial bank has reported this matter, it is yet to provide the details as to how many customers/ cardholders were affected, and the amount of money involved.

Prevent fraudulent activities
Nevertheless, the BoG Head pointed out that, despite these recent breaches being external in nature; that is, on Visa’s end, the Central Bank is continuously working with local banks to prevent such fraudulent activities.
“We ensure that there are certain standards that have to be put in place…They’re looking at their fraud management rules, and those are things that they have to put in place. Whatever system is put in place…we will ask what else can be done to ensure that this system becomes much more robust,” Dr Ganga stated.
Further questioned, the BoG Governor pointed out that there is not much that can be done locally to prevent such breaches, especially in this particular case, where the fraudulent activities emanated from an external source.
He added that Central Bank’s priority in this case is to ensure that customers are reimbursed for any fraudulent transactions detected on their accounts.
“It is indeed a situation where you have to be involved with the bank to ensure that the customers are reimbursed and their Cards are not compromised…[But] there is not much that we can do from our end. This is an international agreement between the commercial bank and Visa…” he explained.
“…What we try to do is to protect the customers here, as a regulator, and to ensure that if there is a fraud, that is it being rectified and is being taken care of. And so the commercial banks have to know who they’re signing up with, and what they’re doing. They have to know the risks involved when they’re doing these things,” Dr Ganga stressed.

Online breaches
This is not the first time that customers of Republic Bank, which is based in Trinidad and Tobago and operates throughout the Caribbean, have experienced online breaches in Guyana.
Back in August 2020, the Republic Bank Guyana Limited had detected fraudulent online payment card activities at some global online merchants. There were confirmed cases of customers’ cards being compromised and their accounts debited for those transactions. A similar situation had played out the previous year.
However, while the financial institution had maintained at the time that these attacks are “quite common” when there is online card usage, Republic Bank Guyana Limited has recently reassured local media entity News Room that its Visa OneCard is safe to use.
Meanwhile, besides Republic Bank, persons have taken to social media to complain about similar fraudulent activities at Citizens Bank. However, the BoG Governor indicated that he has not gotten any such report.