Bangladesh Bank has constituted a committee to unearth the causes behind its latest ICT glitches that halted the inter-bank cheque transactions and electronic fund transfers (EFT).
The committee styled "ICT Infrastructure Management Team" has been asked to submit a report by May 15 explaining the actual reasons behind the technical problem, according to the central bank.
"We've formed a committee which will examine the overall ICT infrastructure, including the recent technical faults that had halted interbank transactions," said central bank's chief spokesperson Serajul Islam on Thursday.
He said the committee will also detect the existing condition of the central bank's IT system and give recommendations to avoid further incidents.
As many as 22 officials will work under the committee, which will also draw up short- and long-term recommendations to strengthen the ICT system, he added.
The committee will also ensure the ICT security of the central bank as well.
Monthly update of the ICT system will have to be submitted to the higher-ups of the central bank.
Mezbaul Haque, general manager of the payment systems department, will lead the team.
"The team will determine the cause and extent of technical faults in the company's ICT infrastructure and what to do in the future. This committee will work to ensure proper management and operation of the overall ICT infrastructure," said Serajul Islam.
This committee will manage and operate all ICT infrastructure of Bangladesh Bank (Data Center, Near Data Center, Disaster Recovery Site, Server Room, Network etc.) from now until further notice. As well as identifying errors, all services will be transferred to the new data center.
Officials say the entire central bank's ICT system was stuck in a cycle, which prevented many timely decisions from being made. The whole ICT system will start a new journey through this.
Interbank electronic cheque transaction and electronic fund transfer (EFT) activities through the Bangladesh Automated Clearing House (BACH) of the central bank were suspended on April 13 due to the disconnection of an optical fibre cable between two data centres of the BB.
The central bank restored the connection between the centres – one at Motijheel and the other at Mirpur – on the evening of April 13, but the operation of the BACH had been inoperable.
The central bank also restored the operation of inter-bank cheque transaction on April 18. But it took more than one week to activate the EFT.
The BACH, the first-ever electronic clearing house in Bangladesh, has two components -- an automated cheque processing system (ACPS) and the EFT. The interbank transactions through the two digital modes are the largest in terms of number and volumes.
For instance, clients submit around one lakh interbank cheques, amounting to around Tk 12,000 crore, per day. The ACPS uses a cheque imaging and truncation technology for electronic presentment and payment of paper-based instruments.
Under the EFT system, around 1.5 lakh transactions are settled by clients every day, amounting to Tk 1,000 crore.
Established in February 2011, the Bangladesh Electronic Fund Transfer Network (BEFTN) was the country's first paperless electronic interbank funds transfer system. It facilitates both credit and debit transactions as a lead over cheque clearing systems.
