Banking: bank clerk jailed for revealing customer information

K. Jeyamary worked for a branch of Malaysia's largest bank, Maybank. When Ramesh asked for help, she unlawfully accessed account information relating to Deputy Education Minister Datuk Dr Wee Ka Siong.

She says she received no payment or other benefit as a result of making the information available.

She printed out the account information - and shortly afterwards it was posted to a blog under the headline "Unmasking Wee Ka Siong."

Sentencing Jeyamary to two days in jail, Judge S. M. Komathy Suppiah took into account that this was the defendant's first offence. Equally important, said the Judge, this was the first time that such an offence had been brought before the Courts. Future cases, the Judge said, would receive much more serious penalties.

Of less merit from a mitigation point of view was the judge's view that the defendant should be treated leniently because she "did not know that the information would be posted online."

Malaysian banking law provides for strict confidentiality of banking information except when requested via a limited number of official channels. BAFIA, as the relevant Act is known, is understood to be covered in the induction training for bank staff.

Therefore, the Defendant's claim to have thought she was helping the police by giving information to a "friend" she knows only as "Ramesh" - but who she knows to be a private investigator - is surely open to question.

The prosecution was brought by Bank Negara Malaysia, the central bank and banking regulator under BAFIA.

Despite being currently unemployed for the past six months having been dismissed when the offence was discovered, the defendant (who pleaded guilty) was fined MYR20,000 (approx GBP4,000) to be paid in five instalments.