Cyber Thieves Swipe Cash from 20,000 UK Bank Accounts

Tesco Bank froze online transactions for its customers after detecting suspicious activity on about 40,000 accounts—and fraudulent withdrawals from about 20,000 of them.

The British bank Nov. 6 decided to block customers from paying with their debit cards online, though they could continue using cards in real life at registers or at ATMs. Chief executive Benny Higgins said the bank is working to restore services and refund affected customers by the end of Tuesday, BBC News reported.

The heist involved siphoning “relatively small amounts” of funds from thousands of accounts over a 24-hour window, such as $20 from one account and $500 from another, according to the BBC.

Higgins said it was “a systematic, sophisticated attack” and declined to share more details.