KOLKATA: A massive manhunt is on to find the criminals involved in looting money from at least three ATMs by using modern techniques.
A few days ago Kolkata Police came to know that three ATM machines of a private bank were hacked and miscreants withdrew around Rs 40 lakh without damaging the machines.
According to police, though the incidents took place between May 14 and May 22, the incidents were reported by the bank authority a few days after.
The robbery came to the knowledge of the bank authority when the personnel from the private agencies went to the ATM kiosks to load money.
The first such incident was reported from the New Market police station on May 25. The two other incidents were reported at the Jadavpur police station and Cossipore police station on May 28.
In every such incident, cops found a loose wire behind the ATM machines which was suspected to have been connected with some sort of a device which was used to obstruct the link between the ATM terminal and the bank's server.
After consulting with the experts, cops came to know that the system is protected with 'end to end encryption' which was broken by sabotaging the network system.
Police also came to know that the bank had instructed the maintenance agency of the ATM machines to upgrade the software system to increase its protection.
Due to some reasons, the said agency did not update the software.
Taking advantage of the issue, miscreants may have attached a device and used some ATM-cum-debit card to put the command for money withdrawal.
Cops suspect that a few employees of the bank were involved in the crime as only they know the loopholes. Earlier such incidents were reported in Delhi with a particular type of ATM
machine.
Though the police stations are probing the cases and scrutinising the CCTV footage, the bank fraud section of the detective department is also investigating the matters. Meanwhile, probe is on.