Bank Account Theft of $11.9 Billion in Vietcombank: App from Japan, Plaintiff Appeals
Prosecution Appeals Entire Judgment
In the first-instance civil judgment No. 08/2024/DSST dated March 20, 2024, by the People’s Court of Tu Son City (Bac Ninh Province) regarding the “Dispute over the Provision of Payment Services” between the plaintiff, Ms. Tran Thi Chuc (born 1974, residing in Tu Son City, Bac Ninh Province) and the defendant, Vietcombank Kinh Bac, the adjudicating panel (ADP) partially accepted Ms. Chuc’s lawsuit, ordering Vietcombank Kinh Bac to compensate the customer 700 million VND out of a total of 11.9 billion VND that the customer lost after transferring money into the payment account.
Following the above judgment, the People’s Procuracy (VKSND) of Tu Son City issued an appellate appeal decision No. 02/QD-VKS-DS, appealing the entire first-instance judgment of the same-level court, requesting the People’s Court of Bac Ninh Province to conduct an appellate trial to amend the first-instance judgment.
In the appeal decision, the VKSND of Tu Son City argued that the first-instance judgment of the People’s Court of Tu Son City in partially accepting the plaintiff’s lawsuit “failed to objectively, comprehensively, fully, and accurately assess the evidence in the case file, violating Article 108 of the Civil Procedure Code”.
The first-instance judgment stated: “Although Vietcombank posted on its website and publicly displayed at the Kinh Bac Branch, due to this form of publicity, the location of the display board was not convenient for customers to access. Thus, the display only had a formal purpose.”
Before and during the execution of the contract, Ms. Chuc did not read the contents of the terms and conditions for opening and using the account at Vietcombank. The bank staff also did not instruct Ms. Chuc to access the text before and during the contract signing process. This was also an indirect cause of Ms. Chuc losing money in her account.
Ms. Chuc currently runs a steel trading business and also works as an administrator at a private kindergarten in Tu Son City.
This is not the first time Ms. Chuc has opened a payment account at Vietcombank. She also has an account at another bank. Therefore, the ADP considered that she was well aware of how to open and use an account.
Moreover, when opening the account, on page 04 of the contract, the section entitled “Customer Commitment” was signed by Ms. Chuc to confirm that she had read and understood the content of the “Terms and Conditions for Opening and Using an Account and Deposit Account at Vietcombank; Terms and Conditions for Using Electronic Banking Services for Individual Customers; Terms and Conditions for Using Authentication Methods for Individual Customers…”.
The Investigation Agency of Bac Ninh Provincial Police determined that from 4:28 PM on April 22, 2022 to 6:07 AM on May 25, 2022, the customer’s account had outgoing transactions totaling 11.9 billion VND. All of these transactions were performed using Smart OTP as the transaction authentication method.
The VKSND determined that the daily transaction limit complied with the regulations, and there was no basis to determine that Vietcombank was at fault in performing electronic banking services beyond the transaction limit, resulting in Ms. Chuc losing 11.9 billion VND to fraudsters.
Illustration: Hai Dang. |
During the aforementioned period, Ms. Chuc never logged into the VCB Digital application on her mobile device to check and monitor balance fluctuations.
“Thus, there is not enough evidence to determine that Vietcombank is at fault in Ms. Chuc losing the 11.9 billion VND in her account and to force the bank to compensate her,” the VKSND argued.
According to the agency, the judgment failed to determine Vietcombank’s specific fault, Ms. Chuc’s damages, and determined the level of compensation to be an estimated 5-6%, but the final decision was to award 700 million VND, which is not in accordance with the provisions of Articles 584, 585, and 589 of the Civil Code.
The judgment found that Vietcombank placed the notice of terms and conditions for opening an account in a location that was “not easily visible,” which was an indirect cause of Ms. Chuc losing money in her account.
However, the judgment did not assess the bank’s fault due to Ms. Chuc not being aware of this to what extent. Did that fault cause damage, causing Ms. Chuc to lose all the money in the account, thereby determining the extent of Ms. Chuc’s damage and the level of compensation?
The determination in the judgment that the compensation should be 5-6% of the total value of the damage, i.e. from 595-714 million VND, but the final decision to force Vietcombank to compensate 700 million VND was “without basis”.
“In the event that Vietcombank is determined to be at fault, the bank’s fault and the extent of damage caused to Ms. Chuc must be determined in order to adjudicate the bank’s liability to compensate accordingly,” the VKSND argued.
Vietcombank’s Response in the Appeal
Along with the VKSND’s appeal decision, Vietcombank, through its authorized representative Vietcombank Kinh Bac, partly appealed the first-instance judgment, requesting the appellate court to reject Ms. Tran Thi Chuc’s lawsuit in its entirety.
In the appeal, Vietcombank Kinh Bac argued that “the judgment appeared to be inconsistent with the provisions of the law and the objective circumstances of the case, did not guarantee Vietcombank’s legal rights and interests, and seriously impacted the reputation of Vietcombank and the commercial banking system in general”.
“The bank fully complied with the SBV’s regulations on opening and using payment accounts, displaying information/documents in accordance with the regulations, implementing all regulations on professional procedures when consulting and preparing account opening files, and providing services to customers,” stated the appeal from Vietcombank Kinh Bac.
Vietcombank staff acted in accordance with legal regulations when receiving, advising, and opening an account for Ms. Chuc, and Ms. Chuc signed and confirmed that she had read, understood, and agreed to the entire content of the terms and conditions for opening an account and using services at Vietcombank.
According to the bank, it is not the bank’s obligation under the law to update customers on new fraud tactics used by criminals.
Nevertheless, the bank regularly issued warnings about new fraud tactics through its own newsletters and notifications on the VCB Digital application.
Tu Nguyen
