BOV restores SEPA payment, works hard post-attack

Bank of Valletta (BOV) restored SEPA payment services, saying they are “now fully operational”, according to a press statement issued on Friday. Kenneth Farrugia said on Thursday they are working on uncovering the sources of the cyberattack.

“BOV is working relentlessly to restore its full payment services as soon as possible. Further developments will be communicated to customers,” the bank said when announcing the restored SEPA payment services.

On Wednesday, BOV shut down services after they learnt that the bank’s systems had been compromised in a cyberattack that falsified transfers valued at €13m. The bank restored some services on Thursday morning.

Unknown sources, questionable restoring of funds

At this point, it is still too early to say who stands behind the attack and the bank says it is making its best efforts in related to recovering the funds, according to a Times of Malta report citing Kenneth Farrugia, Chief Business Development Officer at BOV.

It is difficult to say, however, when the funds will be restored, and whether they can be restored in their entirety, according to another Times of Malta report.

Due to the complexity of international transactions, the bank expects not to be able to retrieve all the money falsified in the cyberattack. In Mr Farrugia said although they can see which banks the money went to, it is not “simply a matter of asking the banks for the money to be reversed”, the Times of Malta reported.

However, Mr Farrugia said that the accounts of clients remained untouched. He also added that no breach of personal data of the bank’s clients had taken place.