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UAE banks block debit cards in response to ATM compromise

After banks in the region experienced multimillion-dollar losses in a $45 million global bank heist that came to light last year, the UAE Central Bank is taking no chances.

August 27, 2014

The compromise of a single ATM in Dubai has caused the Central Bank of the UAE to request that banks block the use of a "significant" number of debit cards, according to a report by GulfNews.com.

One of the FIs, Emirates Bank NBD, told the publication that it had been directed to suspend activity on 69 cards that were used at the compromised ATM of another bank.

Affected cardholders at all banks have been advised that they will be receiving new cards, the report said.

Two UAE banks experienced multimillion-dollar fraud losses two years ago in an ATM card counterfeiting and cash-out scheme that netted $45 million dollars in total from banks around the world.

Regional FI RAKBank was especially hard hit, as the incident involved the theft of prepaid gift card data from the bank's database, as well as the manipulation of spending limits on those cards.