After more than a hundred million dollars was stolen from his bank's account in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in an alleged malware attack, Bangladesh Central Bank Governor Atiur Rahman formally announced his resignation on Tuesday.
Rahman is widely considered one of the country's most respected veteran bankers. In fact, he had been serving his second term as the governor of the country's central bank when the online heist happened.
"I resigned and the prime minister accepted it," Rahman said, speaking about his resignation.
His resignation was confirmed by Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith on Tuesday. The Finance Minister pointed at the theft as the main cause of the veteran banker's resignation.
The brazen hacking attack, which investigators believe was initiated using highly-advanced malware, was one of the largest thefts in recent history. After hacking into the bank's SWIFT system, a specialized messaging system used by banks around the world, the thieves were able to transfer $81 million from the Fed to several accounts in the Philippines.
Another $20 million was also successfully withdrawn from the bank's Fed account and transferred to a Sri Lankan account. Fortunately, the hackers using the messaging system committed a very suspicious typo in its transfer request, which ultimately led to the discovery of the modus operandi.
Upon discovering the suspicious nature of the transfer request, the Sri Lankan central bank reversed the transfer, recovering the funds. The $81 million transferred to the Philippines, however, had already been lost.
A senator from the island nation who is looking into the case stated that $30 million of funds transferred to the Philippines has already been withdrawn in cash by a man of Chinese origin. A full-scale investigation is already underway.
Upon discovery of the heist, Bangladesh considered suing the New York Fed over the loss of funds. The Fed, however, maintains its innocence, stating that it was not the American firm's systems that were compromised.
Despite the firms' differences, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York stated that it is currently cooperating with the Bangladesh Central Bank in order to find some much needed answers to one of the most prominent bank thefts in recent history.