House probe on BPI ‘internal error’ sought
Three party-list lawmakers filed a resolution seeking a House of Representatives inquiry in aid of legislation on the Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI) technical glitch that caused some bank accounts holders to see their savings increase or reduced, an incident that was ruled out as an internal systems error.
In House Resolution 1072, Ako Bicol representatives Rodel Batocabe, Alfredo Garbin Jr., and Christopher Co sought the help of the House committee on banks and financial intermediaries to investigate the “security and stability of bank internal systems in light of the recent BPI internal error.”
READ: BPI reports ‘internal data processing error’
The incident, which caused panic among account holders who saw negative accounts while amused others who saw their savings surge to millions, was deemed a “technical glitch” or an “internal data processing error,” and not a hacking incident.
READ: Woman finds P12.4B in BPI check account
The lawmakers said the House committee needed to dig deeper into the glitch “to find out the root cause of the BPI internal error and to determine the most suitable safeguards in order to prevent such future incident from happening.”
“Considering that banking and financial institutions are businesses imbued with public interest, it is therefore necessary for us to inquire into and find out about the internal error in BPI, which caused panic among many of our constituents, which even worsened an already unstable public perception regarding security of our institutions in light of other recent threats to security,” the resolution read. IDL
