A MASTER-FRAUD THROUGH ICICI NET BANKING THAT WOULD GET YOUR HEART IN YOUR MOUTH!

There are multiple controls and safety measures to check and confirm the authenticity of new accounts and the transactions in those accounts - KYC (Know Your Customer), Net Banking Password, Unique ID code, One time password and the Grid system of alpha-numeric password are supposed to make your transactions sacrosanct and risk free, as claimed by the Bank. These are just mechanisms to dupe the common man, as burglars are having free hand on your hard earned money. Ask those who have lost all their money that have been fraudulently transferred by such IT master-thieves and bank pose a helpless face being your trustee to secure your account balance and information.

I, Ajay Nair – a qualified working professional, resident of Malad (E), Mumbai is just one of them. I hold a salary account with ICICI Bank for the past 7 years having my account no. 001801515893 and have always trusted the bank as a safe place to park my money to run my house and other utilities. However, 14^th Sept 2011 night has changed all my perceptions and trust on such robust control systems of the banker and their ability to co-operate with a genuine customer.

A mastermind of crime was working against me and you can also be a prey to such a transaction. Three accounts were opened in ICICI Bank by crime mongers in the following names :

(A/c no.102701502011)
Pralhad Narhari Adasule
BDD Chawl No.15, R.No.18
G M Bhosle Marg
Worli, Mumbai 400018

(A/c no.161101500567)
Akash Shaw
R.N.T Road Sodepur,
Swadeshi More Panihati
North 24, Parganas
West Bengal 700114

(A/c no.041501509377)
Heena Hitesh Agarwal
B-10, B Wing,
Neelkamal Apartment
Opposite Motiram Park
Bhawani Chowk, Ambernath (E)
Maharashtra 421501

They have surprisingly even passed through KYC and have provided all necessary details of verification to get these accounts opened. Amazing is that they are given the status of Gold card holders having a permit to withdraw 50,000 from ATM at one time.

Having already masterminded on hacking into my Blackberry Reliance connect mobile (a so called high security handheld network), on 14^th Sept night with some alleged help from Reliance Kalbadevi(South Mumbai) based webworld officials, the fraudsters interchanged my connection with theirs late in the night and get their mobile activated (as confirmed by Reliance Nodal office bearers at DAKC, Mumbai). Past 11pm in the night the crime commences. They enter into my ICICI Bank account through Net banking. This itself requires a validation password process and they are successful in breaking this security barrier. Next step, they register their names as payee in my account and bank gives a clearance to the same by providing the password through SMS. Then next, they log in the payment gateway using this one time password (which they receive as SMS from ICICI on their already hacked Reliance mobile connection) and process the netbanking transfer of fund. They also pass the validation by entering my netbanking password. The final security control is the alpha-numeric Grid password which ICICI Bank announces as the safest security mode. These mongers have even passed through this stage, which is the most surprising to know how they have access to this internal banking control, only ICICI Bank can explain or provide justification for failure of their robust mechanism. Having broken all the security barriers, they were free to transact the way they wanted and so they did. In multiple clusters of 8 transactions spread over 5-7 minutes from 14^th Sept 11.54 pm to 11.58pm and then again on 15^th Sept early morning from 5.05am to 5.06am, they transfer Rs 2,29,000/- from my account, leaving just a balance of Rs 407/-. All the money i was saving from my salary over a period of time to repay my loan had gone overnight, thanks to the robust banking system.

What surprises the most is when such repeated transfers are happening from one account to 3 accounts in such a short span and that too in the middle of the night, don’t the bank doubt the process and raise an internal alarm to sound the customer in some manner. Here it is to be noted that in the last seven years of my relationship with ICICI, i have never ever carried out any kind of transactions during these midnight hours. This meant that we customers are left at the absolute mercy of their porous systems without the slightest human intervention even on such highly suspicious midnight fraudulent transactions.

The story continues. Later this money then is immediately withdrawn from 3 ATM’s for Rs 50,000 each. When i get to know of this on 15^th Sept morning, i rushed to the Bank. The Bank confirms to these happenings and is also in a position to trace all these accounts, but do nothing about it, as their internal procedures do not permit them to act upon such crime mongers. Here it is interesting to note that this very same ICICI bank has got Recovery-officers or say “Gundaas” who come banging your door if someone misses his or her loan repayment during any single month; But these very same officers go in the hiding when one of the bank’s genuine customer is in serious trouble.
Under this pretext of procedure, are they providing time to the criminals to reach out to a hide out and be safe!!! This forces me to move to Cyber crime cell and lodge a complaint. They co-operate with me and ask to get a FIR done. Finally on 17^th Sept after going through pain, agony, insult and financials loss, i get my FIR lodged at Kurar Police Station, Mumbai bearing FIR number 223 under sections 419, 420, 34 and 66 (C) (D) I.T.Act.

WHO THE BANKER IS WITH?
Even till date after 34 days, after 35 sleepless nights and after 43 grieving emails from my side even to Ms.Chanda Kochhar, Bank does not own the responsibility of their system failure and is not even willing to provide even an assurance to their customer who posted trust on them and bank with them their hard earned money. They seem to have no value in their eyes for the customer, but the system is sacrosanct to protect those criminals under the gambit of confidentiality. An immediate action by the Banker on 15^th Sept morning could have limited my risk exposure, but they behaved irresponsibly by wasting time till date!!!!

They can allow thugs to open account, operate, do fraudulent transfers from others account to their account and smartly withdraw from their ATM’s, but the Bank’s KYC, IP address details, safety features, ATM video camera footage cannot be accessed on top priority to support a genuine customer. This gambit of processes allows these thugs to go scout free, as they are brisk and operate on jet speed and do not throw the rule books. Its high time Banks should start focusing on Customer’s data and financial security and not make systems to support the Cyber crime planners.

If this can happen to me, next can be you and the response from the Bank shall be the same!!. Today i am completely financially broke, thanks to ICICI BANK & RELIANCE. Next could be you, so beware!!

THE OUTCOME OF THE CASE SO FAR
On the 34^th day since the crime and after 43 grieving emails from my side i.e. on 18^th Oct, ICICI comes up with an offer to me to compensate with Rs.77,516 which was blocked in one of their KYC complaint criminals account after the fraudulent transactions. This to me is not even a pie of the indirect losses I have suffered on top of the direct loss of Rs.2,29,000. All along till date considering the genuineness in the case and considering the clarity about the 3 criminals right since the day of the crime i.e. since 15^th Sept, I was hoping that the bank would support their genuine seven year customer and not the fraudsters. But the above offer from the bank devastates me and now I am reaffirmed about what most Police officers had told me about ICICI – “I made the wrong choice of Bank as most cyber-crimes are reported from ICICI bank only”.