Banks sued over fake cash card use

A 64-year-old man sued two banks Thursday for allegedly failing to prevent cash withdrawals from his accounts by someone using fraudulent cash cards.

In a suit filed with the Tokyo District Court, Tomio Suzuki, a former executive at Tokyo publishing house Kodansha Ltd., is seeking a combined 32 million yen in refunds from Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp.

According to the suit, over a period of several days in early March, someone made 139 transactions, withdrawing between 10,000 yen and 1 million yen each time via automated teller machines at bank branches and convenience stores in eastern and western Japan.

Suzuki found the money was gone from the accounts later when he used an ATM, prompting him to file a criminal complaint with police.

After filing the suit, Suzuki told a news conference, "Withdrawals were made by using someone else's cash cards that carried magnetic information copied from my cards.

"It is a security flaw that no checks were done when large amounts were withdrawn successively, particularly late at night," he said.