The Ministry of Finance proposes to force banks to reimburse part of customer funds stolen by fraudsters

The Ministry of Finance proposes to force banks to reimburse part of the funds stolen by fraudsters from client accounts. This should force credit institutions to more effectively build a cybersecurity system. Representatives of the banking community expect joint responsibility along with law enforcement officers and regulators. Lawyers also consider the initiative difficult to implement and of little use.

On Tuesday, November 14, Director of the Department of Financial Policy of the Ministry of Finance Ivan Chebeskov at the conference “Territory of Financial Security – 2023” said that banks must take responsibility for fraudulent actions against their clients. According to him, they are now fighting fraudsters, but they have no financial interest. “If you say that you will pay, conditionally, half of what they will take from your client, then the motivation is different, then you will try very hard to fight these scammers,” Mr. Chebeskov is sure.

According to the Bank of Russia, last year 14.2 billion rubles were stolen from citizens. Speaking at the plenary session of the SOC forum, Deputy Chairman of the Board of Sberbank Stanislav Kuznetsov suggested that this year this amount will increase to 19 billion rubles. In addition, according to Sberbank, under pressure from criminals, Russian citizens took out loans worth 200 billion rubles.

The Central Bank stated that it is “in constant dialogue with federal executive authorities, including the Ministry of Finance, on the issue of combating the theft of money from bank clients” and is taking an “active part in discussing their initiatives.”

At the same time, they believe that it is premature to comment on the implementation of the proposed mechanism and evaluate it.

The Ministry of Finance’s proposal surprised representatives of the banking community. According to the vice-president of the Association of Russian Banks, Alexey Voylukov, banks did everything possible to combat fraudsters within the framework of what regulators and rule-makers allowed them. “We will not demand that the manufacturer and seller of a wallet or safe reimburse part of the loss from the client’s money stolen from them,” he says. Banks have asked regulators to give them more powers to crack down on fraudsters, such as freezing stolen amounts in their accounts or suspending transactions when they see obvious fraud, but they have not been allowed to prevent them accidentally making the mistake of delaying the correct payment, he said.

The head of the National Financial Market Council, Andrei Emelin, notes that many large banks are already returning small losses to clients without investigation, because this is good for their reputation. “But today most of the losses are due to social engineering, when a person voluntarily, although under the influence of scammers, gives them money. Banks, together with the Central Bank and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, are actively fighting this and are incurring enormous costs to prevent these thefts,” he says.

According to Mr. Voylukov, if law enforcement officers begin to pay for the fact that they cannot quickly find fraudsters, and regulators – for the insufficiently created conditions for an effective fight, then it will be possible to think about general financial responsibility to citizens.

Lawyers also doubt that this initiative can bring positive results.

Artem Makarov, a lawyer in the dispute resolution practice of the Kosenkov and Suvorov law firm, notes that there are certain legal limitations on liability – the relationship between the client and the bank is of a civil nature, which means that, as a general rule, in order to impose liability on the bank, the latter must commit a guilty offense . “In the case of a bank and fraudsters, the bank’s guilt does not seem clear,” he believes. In addition, attempts to shift responsibility can lead to two negative consequences for the client – overcompliance (excessive control over operations) and increased tariffs. “Overcompliance is the only way to reduce losses, but it will create difficulties in usual operations,” says Artem Makarov. At the same time, banks will not be able to exclude any situations of illegal actions, which means they will have to strengthen their protection and shift the risks to someone else. “The only reasonable way to compensate for such losses is to increase tariffs,” explains the lawyer.

In the summer, a law was passed according to which banks must return the entire amount stolen from a citizen, although only if the recipient of the transfer is on the blacklist (see “Kommersant” dated January 12). According to the managing partner of Novator Legal Group, Vyacheslav Kosakov, “if we are talking about sharing losses for any fraudulent actions, then this is unfair to banks, which will be held responsible, among other things, for non-compliance with security requirements by the clients themselves.”

Maxim Builov