Experts evaluated the initiatives of the Bank of Russia to combat cyber fraudsters

To oblige banks to return to their customers the money they transferred to the accounts of fraudsters, as well as to suspend access to suspicious accounts for two days – such legislative initiatives aimed at combating cyber fraudsters were made by the Central Bank.

Appropriate amendments are planned to be made to Law on the national payment system and government bill on assistance to internal affairs bodies in counteracting fraudulent activities, which the State Duma adopted in the first reading in July this year.

Whether the measures taken will be effective and how feasible they are, Moskovskaya Pravda found out from experts.

– Payments on the Internet on sites – clones of online stores and payment systems, as well as deception with the help of assurances that citizens allegedly invest in assets on the stock market or cryptocurrency have become a headache for law enforcement officers, banks and the Central Bank. But the real “scourge” was fraud using IP-telephony. You can make a call from anywhere in the world, and the called subscriber will see a pre-purchased phone number. Therefore, it is almost impossible to trace the criminals, as well as to prove their guilt, – said Nikolai Pereslavsky, an employee of the Department of Economic and Financial Studies of the CMS Institute.

According to the expert, in 2021, funds in the amount of 13.5 billion rubles were transferred to fraudsters from bank accounts alone. But only 6.8% of this amount was returned to clients of financial institutions. In 2020, the percentage of refunds by banks was at the level of 11.3% of the total amount of stolen funds, and in 2019 it was 14.6%. The reason for this decline was the improvement of ways to implement fraudulent activities. According to the results of the 1st quarter of 2022, the Russians transferred almost 3.3 billion rubles to fraudsters, which is 17.9% more compared to the 1st quarter of 2021.

“It must be admitted that the situation continues to deteriorate and the adoption of emergency measures at the state level is overdue,” the expert notes.

However, Nikolai Pereslavsky believes that the Central Bank’s initiative to suspend access to suspicious accounts has both positive and negative sides.

— On the one hand, the ability to suspend for 2 days any transfers to a suspicious account is a very useful action. The victim of fraud, realizing his mistake, may have time to return the funds. On the other hand, there is a possibility that a client dissatisfied with the services provided or the goods received may slander the entrepreneur or company. This will put their accounts on the list of suspicious accounts and will significantly hinder business. After all, you will need to prove your innocence, which will take some time, but at the same time you will need to pay taxes and salaries to employees, fulfill obligations to counterparties, and so on, the economist explains his point of view.

So, in his opinion, the situation in banks already affected by the global financial crisis will by no means improve after the adoption of a law obliging banks to return funds transferred to fraudsters to customers. Indeed, in this case, banks will have to allocate part of the capital from circulation and direct it to special funds, from which funds will be sent to the victims of fraudsters. And if the top 10 credit institutions can create such funds almost without difficulty, then for smaller banks, the need to allocate capital in advance and return the funds lost by clients can become a “verdict”.

– Some part of the citizens can, of course, and will become more easy to start transferring funds, including to scammers. But most Russians have already learned from bitter experience – their own or friends and relatives, so they are very suspicious of any phone calls from unfamiliar numbers. Most likely, the process of increasing financial literacy among the population will gradually increase in our country. And here the question concerns the security of payments on the Internet, attentiveness to calls, as well as knowledge about investments. It will be especially useful if the state, stock exchanges and the banks themselves take an active part in this process,” says Nikolai Pereslavsky.

Pyotr Gusyatnikov, Senior Managing Partner of PG Partners law firm, also expressed his opinion about the initiative of the Central Bank to Moskovskaya Pravda.

“Despite all the measures taken by the state and banking structures, despite the fact that fraudulent schemes are regularly replicated in the media, the number of victims of swindlers is not significantly reduced,” the lawyer notes. “This is largely due to the fact that fraudsters use social engineering methods, and the population, in such periods of instability as now, is psychologically more vulnerable. Fraudsters also come up with new and new schemes. For example, this spring they offered to transfer money to safe accounts in order to protect them from possible bank blockages. Also, scammers may offer to return money stolen by themselves or other scammers. There are a lot of options, but the essence is the same – a citizen loses his money.

Pyotr Gusyatnikov recalled that now, according to the law, responsibility for transfers made by a citizen from his bank card or account lies with him, provided that the bank does not know that the citizen’s data has been compromised. A person independently enters pin codes and passwords, he transfers money to scammers. That is why it is so difficult to deal with attackers using social engineering methods. The bank in this case is just an executor. He cannot reliably know whether a citizen transfers his money to a fraudster or not. It is this situation that various scammers take advantage of. Moreover, due to this approach, it is almost impossible to cancel erroneous transactions, when, for example, a person made a mistake in the details and the money went to the wrong addressee.

– The measures proposed by the Central Bank are to some extent capable of reducing the number of fraudulent transfers, but cannot protect citizens by 100%. Because banks want to oblige to compensate transfers that are made to accounts located in the dropper base. But far from all accounts are contained there, and scammers are constantly finding new options. As soon as the account enters the database, they start using another one, and until the new account enters the database, they manage to deceive more than one person,” said Pyotr Gusyatnikov.

In his opinion, for financial organizations, the initiative of the Central Bank to oblige banks to return funds transferred to fraudsters to customers is not beneficial for the banks themselves, so they will also look for loopholes.

– Most likely, the victim will need to collect an impressive package of documents, including from the Ministry of Internal Affairs. The Ministry of Internal Affairs, in turn, strongly dislikes such cases, because it is very difficult to find criminals here, they often work from other states. Therefore, citizens may face a lot of delays. It is also possible that such cases will have to be resolved in court, where the bank will prove its case, and the citizen – his own, – the lawyer believes. – The only thing that can work effectively is if banks do not allow transfers to dropper accounts.

But the introduction of a suspension for two days of transfers of funds on the account, information about which is in the database of droppers, the expert considers it useful.

– In general, in principle, I believe that giving citizens a kind of “cooling off period” for any bank transfers, at least for a few hours, during which a citizen can cancel the operation, is the only effective option in such a situation. In most cases, people realize that they have been deceived immediately – within the first hour. This is effective not only against fraudsters, but also against erroneous transfers. Because, in fact, now the only effective option to return the money that was mistakenly transferred to someone else’s account is if the second party voluntarily gives it back. Otherwise, you can act through the courts, but this is not always easy, usually long and without guarantees.

So while the bills initiated by the Central Bank have not been adopted, everyone will have to protect their funds from scammers and be attentive to money transfers on their own.

Alena Bodrienko.

Photo of Moskovsky Pravda