Belgian judge: banks must immediately compensate phishing damage

The corporate court in Antwerp rules that banks must immediately compensate phishing damage. The summary proceedings were initiated by a couple who had suffered 49,958 euros in damages due to phishing. The bank refused to reimburse this, but has now been ruled against by the judge.

The couple, aged 90 and 93, received a call in January from someone posing as an employee of the bank, HLN reports. The couple was convinced to make two transfers totaling 49,958 euros to an unknown account in Portugal. The bank suspected that the couple had been grossly negligent in going through the steps necessary to approve the transaction. That is why she refused to compensate the damage.

According to the judge, the law requires that the bank must immediately reimburse the damage, unless it has reasonable grounds to suspect that the customer himself is committing fraud. Such an investigation takes too long to be conducted in summary proceedings. According to him, a suspicion of gross negligence is no reason not to repay. The bank must first pay back the money. Only then can she choose to start proceedings to recover the money. According to HLN, this 'rarely or never' happens in practice.

Groundbreaking

Lawyer Geert Lenssens, who is not involved in the case, calls the ruling 'groundbreaking': "This decision will remove tens of thousands of similar files from the impasse," he tells HLN. "This ruling is a serious slap on the fingers of the banking sector, because banks do everything they can to avoid having to pay. After all, it concerns millions of euros. I would advise everyone in such a situation to file summary proceedings against their bank."

Minister Rob Beenders of Consumer Protection welcomes the decision and says that the banks apply the rules in a way that is contrary to national and European law. This makes it more difficult for victims to receive the compensation they are legally entitled to, he told the Flemish newspaper. "I will meet again with the banks about this on Thursday. They will also explain to me their work on the action plan that I have requested from them. I hope for a constructive conversation."