Reports indicate that last Saturday, the Commercial Bank of Ethiopia (CBE), the largest commercial bank in the country, experienced system malfunctions. Customers were able to withdraw more money from ATMs than they requested.
This incident quickly spread among groups of students from various universities, prompting long lines at ATMs even at 1 am. The bank eventually noticed the error, suspended transactions, and police officers were called in to halt withdrawals.
The Central Bank of Ethiopia attributed the incident to a mistake during system maintenance. CBE estimates the damage at around 2.4 billion Ethiopian birr, approximately 1.5 billion baht, with over 500,000 transactions affected. The bank will collaborate with law enforcement to recover the excess funds.
Source: BBC and Sky News
TLDR: The Commercial Bank of Ethiopia experienced a system malfunction leading to customers withdrawing more money than requested, causing significant financial damage. Police had to intervene to stop the withdrawals. The Central Bank attributed the issue to maintenance errors and will work to recover the excess funds.
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