(UPDATE) TWO banks linked to “unauthorized cash transfers” from GCash said they were investigating the incident on Tuesday, when the e-wallet application went offline, causing panic among its clients.
EastWest Bank (EWB), which was first identified as the recipient of the cash transactions, posted on its Facebook account that it was cooperating with authorities after one of its alleged accounts had been identified as being behind the incident.
Asia United Bank (AUB) also released a statement after it was alerted by netizens about an account number ending in 3008 that was being used in the GCash transactions and said that it had “immediately put the account on hold” pending results of an investigation.
In a statement on Wednesday, EastWest said that it had “been made aware by netizens regarding the deduction of thousands of pesos from their GCash wallets into an alleged EWB account ending in 5239.”
“The bank immediately acted on these reports and initiated an internal investigation,” EWB wrote. “Rest assured that EastWest is cooperating with authorities and other institutions involved in the said report and working towards the immediate resolution on the matter.”
AUB said it was alerted as early as May 8 of funds being transferred “via InstaPay to an AUB account,” prompting the bank to “temporarily put the AUB account on hold.”
Emma Cabochan, AUB’s legal services head and data privacy officer, said the bank was cooperating with GCash on the matter and assisting it in looking into the alleged account.
GCash, Globe Telecom’s e-wallet arm, adjusted users’ wallets after a lengthy maintenance that saw users see a “We’ll be right back” message appear on the application.