The deposit money banks (DMBs) operating in the country lost a total of N3.8 billion to fraud and forgery in six months, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has said.
The 2013 Half Year Economic Report released by the CBN on Wednesday shows that the number and value of reported cases of fraud and forgery in the banking industry increased in six month in 2013.
There were 2,478 reported cases of fraud and forgery valued at N22.4 billion. This was higher than the 2,300 recorded cases, valued at N7.1 billion in the corresponding period of 2012. Of this amount, the actual loss incurred by the banks was N3.8 billion, representing 17.1 percent of the total fraud amount, compared with N2.5 billion in the corresponding period of 2012.
According to the apex bank, the frauds were carried out through diverse means, including fraudulent withdrawals from customers’ “accounts, suppression and conversion of customers” deposits, theft, illegal funds transfer, cheque defalcations, and fraudulent ATM withdrawals, among others.
To mitigate the increased operational risk as a result of these frauds, several measures were recommended to improve the DMBs risk manage of ment control function. The measures included the implementation of stricter internal control, improved technology audit to routinely check employees activities and a more thorough approach to hiring employees for highly sensitive areas of operation.
However, the CBN received 759 complaints from the banking public against the DMBs in respect of excess charges, conversion of deposit, unauthorised deductions, among others
