Taiwan says foreign suspects arrested over $2 million ATM cyber robbery

First Financial Holding

17/07/2016 15:52

TAIPEI, July 17 (Reuters) - Police in Taiwan said on Sunday 
they had arrested three out of 16 foreign suspects they believe 
hacked into the cash machines of a major local bank, withdrawing 
more than $2 million. 
    They are accused of targeting First Bank's ATMs last week, 
using malware to withdraw more than T$80 million ($2.5 million) 
from dozens of machines. urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N19Z17K   
    A policeman recognised one of the suspects, a Latvian, while 
he was eating in a restaurant in the northeastern city of Yilan. 
  Police arrested him later, an official of the Taipei City 
Police Department told a news briefing.  
    Two other suspects, who are from Romania, were arrested in 
Taipei, police said, adding they had found more than T$50 
million of the stolen money in a hotel room.  
    "This is the first time that an international team of ATM 
thieves has committed a crime in Taiwan," Lee Wen-chang, chief 
commander of the Criminal Investigation Division, told 
reporters. 
    Authorities are still investigating exactly how the crime 
was carried out, he said.  
    The remaining 13 suspects, including two from Russia, have 
left Taiwan, police said, adding they had alerted authorities 
overseas.  
    The suspects may have used a cellphone to target 41 First 
Bank ATMs, investigators said on Wednesday.  
    In May, a gang stole $13 million from Japanese ATMs in a 
three-hour spree.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL5N18M1WJ 
    Since discovering the Taiwan theft last Monday, Taiwan's 
major state-run banks have frozen withdrawals from nearly 1,000 
ATMs of the kind targeted in the heist, which are supplied by 
Germany's Wincor Nixdorf  WING.DE . 
    About 4 percent of Taiwan's national ATM network of 27,200 
machines are affected.   
    Investigators have identified three different malware 
programmes that were used to trigger withdrawals.  
 
 (Reporting by Faith Hung; Editing by Andrew Bolton) 
 ((faith.hung@thomsonreuters.com; 8862 2500 4893; Reuters 
Messaging: faith.hung.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net)) 
 
Keywords: TAIWAN BANKS/THEFT