Banks block cards to prevent fraud

Bengaluru: After a recent incident where two foreigners were caught for ATM skimming fraud activities here, the banks have blocked a few cards of its customers for security reasons.

The banking industry has resorted to a large-scale blocking of cards to avoid any fraudulent transactions.

Canara Bank and Corporation Bank have blocked cards of hundreds of customers in the city to prevent siphoning off customers’ cash.

Kotak Mahindra Bank sent out messages to their customers to change their PIN numbers.

Canara Bank has blocked close to 1,000 cards and is expected to block more cards in the coming days.

In a message to select customers, the bank said, “Dear Cardholder Referring to News item that there may be likely threat on certain cards us as a pro-active measure blocked your card. Contact your base branch for replacement of card.”However, the bank will not be charging any fee for replacing such cards, a bank official said adding, “There has been no case of ATM fraud till now.”

The bank has informed all customers who used the three affected ATMs during the period between September 1 and September 12, 2017 through SMS and email to change their ATM PIN to prevent any misuse.

Corporation Bank has blocked close to 70 cards in Bangalore.

State Bank of India (SBI), has however not blocked any cards till now. “Till the time the skimmer doesn’t get access to PIN and CVV of customers, they are safe. There is no use of blocking cards, unless we see some suspicious activity,” Neeraj Vyas, Deputy Managing Director and COO of SBI said.