Press release 04/06

Furtwangen, 09.02.2006 – Online banking with HBCI is recommended by critical financial experts.
“This recommendation will hopefully bring even more momentum to the HBCI market,” says Carsten Sommer, Managing Director of REINER SCT, the market leader for chip card readers.
These card readers are required if you decide to use the secure method to carry out your banking transactions online.
The widespread use of online banking with the PIN-TAN procedure is a direct consequence of “phishing” activities.
Online thieves try to obtain passwords and PIN information by asking users to disclose their sensitive data.
“If all banks were to offer their customers online banking with HBCI more actively and convincingly, ‘phishing’ would soon no longer be an issue,” Sommer is certain.
In the startling article by Finanztest, the victims describe the scenarios that are now common when it comes to phishing.
One thing becomes clear: the methods used by cyber criminals are becoming increasingly sophisticated.
Sending fake emails is only the most obvious way to obtain sensitive data such as PINs.
“What’s happening here is no longer a trivial offence or sporting hacking, but organized crime,” says Sommer angrily.
The IT expert is all the more pleased that consumer protection is now taking action to solve the problem in advance.
This is because the HBCI standard enables secure communication via the Internet.
This means that the PIN is entered directly into a chip card reader and not routed via the PC, as with a normal computer keyboard.
“This also means it cannot be copied and misused”.
Of course, online banking with HBCI costs a little more than the “already outdated” PIN-TAN procedure, because the bank customer has to purchase a corresponding card reader.
Even if the banks usually subsidize the security package for home banking in the interests of customer friendliness, there are additional costs.
This is why banks are sometimes reluctant to recommend this secure procedure to their customers.
“But there are already banks that consistently offer their customers the secure HBCI procedure.”
Carsten Sommer hopes that there will be even more so that the phishing spook will soon be put to an end. (The text comprises approx. 2,740 characters)