Misappropriation of 0.5 billion won of Company Funds through Internet Banking

▽incident occurrence = Mr. Jin (57, real estate lease business, Unlim-dong Donggu Gwangju) who is the customer of Kookmin bank(Gwangju branch), reported that 128,020,000 won was illegally withdrawn from his bank account. So, the cyber crime investigation department of Jeonnam provincial police agency announced that it has started an investigation on January 27.

According to the police, a man in 30th year came closed to Mrs. Gwon(65), the dollar changer of Myeongdong 2-ga Jung-gu Seoul and said “I am in urgent need of dollar money.” The man changed 75000 dollars and remitted to accounts in the name of Mrs. Gwon, her husband and her brother five times after drawing out 90 million won from the account of Mr. Jin.

A criminal connected to the phone banking service of Kookmin bank by her mobile phone in front of Mrs. Gwon. The criminal inputted the user number, user password, approval number by individual, account number and pin number of Mr. Jin in order, and then asked Mrs. Gwon to confirm the remittance.

After that, the criminal said “I will buy gift certificates” to Mr. Lim (42), a street trader in Myeongdong 2-ga in the morning on January 4. Then the criminal remitted 28,500,000 won from the account of Mr. Jin to the bankbook account of Mr. Lim and then received 300 gift certificates of 100,000 won.

Then, the criminal remitted 9520000 won to the Mr. Lim (53), the street trader in the same manner and received 100 department stores gift certificates.

▽Investigation direction of the police = The police recognized that the criminal knew the phone banking connection information such as the user password and approval number by individual of Mr. Jin. The police has conducted the investigation focused on△an implication possibility of the bank staff, △a wiretapping of the bank terminal and △a crime of surrounding people of the sufferer.

The Kookmin bank said, “Only customer can know the user password and approval number but the bank staff cannot know”. However, the police cannot completely rule out the possibility of bank-insider complicity considering that the individual information can be exposed when the bank security system is cancelled.

The police is investigating the possibility of that the criminal finds out a personal information by attaching the wiretapping machine or the number reader in the phone banking ARS switch terminal like the illegal phone banking withdrawal incident of Hana bank (Cheongdam-dong) in 1998 or that the wiretapping machine is installed in the phone of Mr. Jin.

Also, the police has been investigating that his personal information was exposed by carelessness of Mr. Jin and his surrounding people who knew the phone banking transactions of the sufferer.

The police found out that another man inquired the balance of the account by connecting to the phone banking service when the criminal met the dollar changer as the result of the investigation for the phone banking connection records of Kookmin bank. Accordingly, there could be over minimum 2 criminals.

▽Investigation Progress = The police confirmed the identity of money changers after receiving a confiscation search warrant for three commercial banks which the money of Mr. Jin was remitted to. The police analyzed the phone banking connection records of Kookmin bank, but the police couldn’t find any definite clue.

The police has investigated his neighboring people and ordered witnesses to confront with certain illegal dollar dealers. However, there were not criminals.

Mr. Jin said, “The incident seems to be caused by a hacking. I’ve never lost my phone banking information from my carelessness. There is no problem in my surroundings.”

shjung@donga.com