Think twice before sending money via IBAN

At a time when heavy penalties on payments made via IBAN are being debated, banks have added a new IBAN-based payment option to their mobile applications.

While the heavy penalties recently introduced for payments made via IBAN have sparked debate, banks are adding a new IBAN-based payment option to their mobile applications. Thanks to the "REQUEST PAYMENT" button, you can send a payment request to any person or company that has an IBAN number.

You specify the requested amount and designate your own account as the recipient. When the user logs into their banking application, they see the payment request as a message, and as soon as they approve it, the specified amount is transferred to the account of the person requesting the payment.

However, according to Fraud Audit and Forensic Accounting Expert Fikriye Aslan, this new payment practice opens the door to new and highly dangerous abuses.

According to a report by Haber Global, Aslan states that he does not know how much banks have tested this practice, but questions why it has spread so rapidly. Warning users, Aslan says, "It is important to trust banks, but we must also take malicious individuals seriously."

Stating that it is difficult to understand the purpose behind the launch of such an arbitrary and unregulated payment practice at a time when payments made to the IBANs of tradespeople, in particular, pose a major problem, Aslan warns people based on his 35 years of professional experience:

"Abuse is a situation that will never end as long as humans exist. Our citizens who are unfamiliar with technology are at particularly high risk. We must trust systems instead of people, and poorly designed systems will always be the target of malicious individuals."