By Elizabeth Hearst
A Saudi engineering company is suing Natwest in the UK High Court after it claims that it was tricked into sending $5 Million to a Natwest bank account in Brixton.
The engineering subsidiary of Italy’s Marie Tecnimont, Tecnimont Arabia will bring legal action after it claims it fell victim to an “authorised push payment” scam, according to The Times.
It is alleged that an email account of a senior employee in the group was hacked, and an email was sent advising a $5 Million payment to be sent to a Natwest account in Brixton in October 2018.
Following on from this payment, Tecnimont Arabia claims that large amounts of money were subsequently transferred out to accounts in Croatia, the Czech Republic, Hong Kong, Hungary and Poland whilst triggering two internal fraud reports at Natwest.
Tecnimont is requesting a payment of $3.76 Million plus interest and costs from the British bank, which was the amount that was present in the Brixton account when the first fraud alarm was activated.
The Saudi engineering group claims that Natwest fell short of the “standards of commercially acceptable conduct for a bank in relation to the prevention of fraud, money laundering, terrorist financing and financial crime”.
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