FX.co ★ Hong Kong authorities caught Citibank on sale of customer information

Hong Kong financial regulator has condemned four major banks - Citibank, ICBC, Fubon Bank and Wing Hang Ban – in transfer of information about their own customers to third parties, as reported by AFP. Moreover, three of them - Citibank, ICBC and Fubon Bank – were not just giving away the data, but they were selling it. Thus, the regulator believes that ICBC sold data of about 17 thousand customers to insurers.
Fubon Bank admitted transferring the information of 33 thousand clients to an unnamed insurance company, but they said that they stopped doing this in August 2010. ICBC and Wing Hang have not yet commented on the allegations of Hong Kong authorities.
Citibank, in their turn, said that keeping client information is the "top priority" for the organization. In addition, as noted by Hong Kong authorities, Citibank and Fubon assured the regulator that privacy policy will never be violated again.
In accordance with Hong Kong laws, sale of personal data without client permission is not a crime.