LE 2.7M stolen from clients of Banque Misr

CAIRO – 23 August 2021: Clients of Banque Misr were subjected to 13 incidents of theft by unknown persons, with a total value of LE 2.7 million, according to Mohamed El-Etreby, head of the bank.

In a statement published on its official Facebook page, the bank noted a fraud that occurred in a branch of it in the city of Samalout, located in Minya Governorate, but did not provide details in the statement.

El-Etreby indicated that this matter was repeated, and that there were approximately 13 incidents during which 2 million and 700 thousand pounds were withdrawn.

The head of Banque Misr explained how a fraud crime was committed by a gang formation, deceived a woman of the bank's customers, and stole more than 200 thousand pounds from her account.

He added, during a TV interview, on Saturday evening, that the woman is from Minya Governorate, and the thief’s illusion is through pretend providing helping to use the electronic system, and he asked her for the number he received from the bank to use in updating the data.

He explained that the woman gave him the number as a result of her unawareness, pointing out that it is only possible to deal with the account through this number, and therefore if someone obtained it, he could deal with the account.

He stressed that various banks send messages to customers asking them not to disclose their data, including the bank's employees, pointing out that the communication should be with the bank's number directly.

He continued: "There is a gang formation that takes advantage of the customer's lack of knowledge, and communicates with him and deludes him that he has won a prize, but he needs his data for transfer, and then a secret number from the bank arrives on the customer's phone, which in turn gives it to the "caller (quorum)."

He stressed that Egyptian banks were not exposed to any penetration in the fraud crimes that occurred, stressing that depositors' funds are completely safe.

The bank was not exposed to any penetration by hackers, according to El-Etreby, who confirmed that what happened was a mistake by the client who gave the secret code to the gang formations.