“Hacking of cyber protection at Universalbank and InfinBank was the fault of the banks” – CB Chairman

Central Bank Chairman Mamarizo Nurmuratov said that last year’s cybersecurity breaches at Universalbank and InfinBank were the fault of the banks’ security systems. He said this on January 25 at a press conference, Spot correspondent reports.

“The loss of the population’s money through the cybersecurity system, cybersecurity hacking was committed in two banks. This is due to the fault of the mobile application system of these banks – in May Universalbank and in April InfinBank. The amount is not so large – in my opinion, about 300 million soums, this concerns Universalbank. Now I’m afraid of making a mistake, but there are not such large soums or billions,” Nurmuratov shared.

According to him, the country’s leadership instructed the Central Bank to develop a mechanism to minimize citizens’ losses. If the theft occurred through the fault of banks, then the population will not lose anything, and credit institutions will reimburse the stolen amount, as in the cases of Universalbank and InfinBank, he said.

Nurmuratov noted that to prevent fraud, which occurs due to low financial literacy of citizens, the regulator is amending the legislation.

“Any person can tell his bank or the institution from which he carries out the transaction that he does not want to take out a loan. This person will automatically be blocked from all mobile methods of access to lending. The same applies to the antifraud system. We are now also strengthening our requirements not only for commercial banks, but also for microcredit organizations,” the CB head concluded.

In addition, the Central Bank requires confirmation of the issuance of loans not only through a facial recognition system, but also through other channels. Nurmuratov admitted that these measures may be considered a tightening of lending conditions, but the regulator intends to use the mechanism to combat fraud.

Last November, Gazeta.uz published stories of its readers who became victims of cyber fraud. The victims said that on the night of November 11, transactions from bank cards were made through the Unired mobile application, owned by Universalbank, without their knowledge.

Later, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Universalbank Anvar Irchayev, in a conversation with Gazeta.uz, said that the scammers managed to steal about 300 million soums, and the remaining 200 million were detained by the anti-fraud system. He also denied false information about alleged write-offs worth billions of soums.

Earlier, it was reported that the integration of Uzcard and HUMO terminals is planned to be completed by the end of March.