THE CHAIRMAN of the House committee on banks and financial intermediaries has urged the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) to shorten the deadline for bank’s compliance on the shift to Europay MasterCard Visa (EMV) chip-embedded cards.
Eastern Samar Rep. Ben P. Evardone, the panel’s chairman, said in a letter dated July 3 addressed to the newly installed BSP Governor Nestor A. Espenilla, Jr. that they have received reports of “fraudulent activities” like skimming on automated teller machines (ATMs) of local banks.
“Skimming was attempted upon ATMs of the Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) last year, resulting in the apprehension of foreign nationals. Also, the Banco De Oro (BDO) Bank reported recent skimming attempts upon its ATMs,” Mr. Evardone said in his letter.
“In this regard, I am urging the Monetary Board and the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas to shorten the deadline to Dec. 31, 2017 instead of its original June 30, 2018 deadline for banks’ compliance on the upgrade to EMV of our ATM Cards,” he added.
An EMV chip-embedded card has enhanced security features, which include encryption locks and keys to authenticate the card and transactions, protecting data from being compromised.
Mr. Evardone said that criminals are becoming “more sophisticated” in their fraudulent activities.
“Hence, unless the deadline for compliance is shortened, we fear that more bank clients will be victimized, to the prejudice of the national interest in general, and the banking industry in particular,” the committee chairman added. — Raynan F. Javil
