Cyberthieves are looting Japanese bank accounts in record numbers, and police say Chinese crime groups are increasingly to blame. Criminals stole 1.85 billion yen ($16 million) from accounts at lenders including Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MTU) and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group (SMFG) in the first half of the year, surpassing the full-year record of 1.41 billion yen in 2013, according to Japan’s National Police Agency. Of 133 arrests related to the thefts during that time, Chinese nationals made up the largest group with 83, or 62 percent, almost double the arrests of Japanese. “We see a very deep Chinese connection in these cybertheft cases,” says Arichika Eguchi, the police agency’s director of cybercrime investigations. “Japanese people’s wealth is draining into China.”

The scams involve multiple steps, say police: Chinese gangs hack into Japanese bank accounts by tricking customers into opening malicious software or disclosing their passwords. They steal the money by transferring it to other accounts in Japan, then hire people who live in the country to withdraw the cash at ATMs. Those people deliver the money to colleagues in Japan who use it to buy goods that are shipped to China. There the products are sold, with the proceeds going to the ringleaders.

Japan’s biggest banks—Mitsubishi UFJ, Sumitomo Mitsui, and Mizuho Financial Group (MFG)—are alerting customers about the increase in online theft and compensating victims on a case-by-case basis, say spokesmen for the three companies. The country is an easy target because of its wealth and proximity to China, as well as lack of experience dealing with computer hacking, says Hiroshi Koide, an associate professor of artificial intelligence at Kyushu Institute of Technology. “Japanese people and companies aren’t very sophisticated when it comes to computer security,” says Koide, who advises the Fukuoka Prefectural Police on cybercrime countermeasures. “Japan’s huge assets ensure big profits.”

(Bloomberg Businessweek)