Court forces bank to pay smishing victim compensation

The Provincial Court of Asturias has sentenced a bank to compensate a client with 5,828.35 euro for the fraudulent use of a credit card by third parties after downloading the entity’s app.

The affected person received an SMS in which the bank itself was listed as the sender and in which it was indicated that, to use the card, the recipient had to activate the new security system on the website. This message sent the victim to an internet link in which they were asked to identify their username, NIF and password. After this, the victim received several charges on the account that were not authorised.

“The bank’s security mechanisms did not work to protect the client. It is necessary to reinforce them when it comes to saving your data, installing double signature verification systems, preventing your message channels or contact telephone numbers from being used, as well as the duplication of images on your website,” says Diego Cueva Díaz, lawyer of the affected person.

The ruling indicates that the lack of coherence of the message when addressed to the client or the omission of some punctuation marks cannot be considered sufficient to alert a person that this message is fraudulent. Nor can an average user be considered aware that the website they accessed was a Russian domain.

“The existence of fraud was evidenced by the existence of transfers to remote locations and unknown people,” says Cueva.

To prove it, the lawyer explains, “we request the application to the case of Royal Decree Law 19/2,018 on payment instruments by a third party, which specifies that the client will bear the losses only in the event that they act fraudulently. This decree also determines that the payment service provider acts diligently in authenticating the operation. And if the error is induced by a cybercriminal, it cannot be understood that there is serious fault on the part of the user.”

The court emphasises that carrying out anti-phishing campaigns warning its clients of cyber dangers was not enough to avoid the banking entity’s responsibility in this case.

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