Banks to combat unauthorised operations in order to protect customer funds

A new federal law has been adopted. It sets forth legal grounds enabling credit institutions to counter unauthorised operations, including with the help of antifraud systems.

This innovation primarily seeks to cut down the number of unauthorised operations made using remote banking, as well as to prevent the loss of funds from bank accounts of credit institutions and their customers (individuals and legal entities).

The law also creates the legal framework of returning unduly transferred funds to corporate customers.

Several provisions of the law streamline the process of information exchange between banks and other national payment system agents and the Bank of Russia about all instances of, and attempts at, unauthorised operations using Bank of Russia information services, and also the procedure for the regulator to create a data base on such actual and attempted unlawful operations.

The law introduces another important innovation, i.e. the expansion of the Bank of Russia’s mandate to regulate information security issues in the financial market.

“The adoption of the law signifies an important milestone towards reducing the level of theft in the national payment system and protecting the financial assets of bank customers (both individuals and legal entities)”, said Artyom Sychev, acting director of the Bank of Russia Information Security Department.

The law becomes effective 90 days after its official publication.