MAGHE SHANGRATI BEING OBSERVED Kathmandu, 14 Jan.: Maghe Shangrati is being observed Monday as devotees takp a holy dip at river confluences. Thousands of devotees are thronging Debighat and President Dr. Ram Baran Yadav s flying to Ridi where a five-day mela has been organized. The days get longer and nights shorter coinciding with Maghe Shangrati indicating the beginning of the end of winter and onset of spring. Delicacies made from yam, molasses and butter are the day’s delight. For Tharus the day marks their new year. Nnnn MONDAY’S MORNING TEMPERATURE OVER VALLEY WARMER Kathmandu, 14 Jan. The morning temperature over the Valley warned Monday. The temperature was 2 degrees Celsius. Mercury is expected to rise to 18 degrees Celsius in the afternoon. Nnnn CAMPAIGN TO CURB MEASLES EXTENDED Kathmandu, 14 Jan.: The third or final phase of the measles-rubella (MR) campaign has been extended in Lalitpur, Kavre and Dhanusha districts, The Himalayan Times reports. The Ministry of Health and Population has been conducting the anti-measles and rubella campaign in 35 districts of the central and eastern development regions since mid-December. The ministry decided to extend the monthlong campaign after some of the districts failed to meet the deadline, said Giri Raj Subedi, chief of immunisation section, Child Health Division at the health ministry. “Winter vacation in schools has affected the vaccination campaign in Lalitpur, Kavre, and Dhanusha districts,” said Subedi. The division has decided to cover the remaining areas in the two regions within a week starting from January 15, he added. The third phase has set a target of vaccinating around 5,564,577 children above the age of nine months to 15 years in 35 districts. Vaccination booths have been set up at government and private schools, ward offices and health institutions. According to the preliminary report, the districts have above 93 per cent coverage. The government is initiating the campaign to reduce illness and death due to measles and rubella after these two diseases were documented as significant public health problems in the country. Rubella is usually a mild febrile rash in adults and children. Serious consequences may occur if a pregnant woman becomes infected, particularly if infection occurs during the first trimester. The consequences include a constellation of birth defects known as congenital rubella syndrome (CRS) or even death. Common manifestations of CRS include cardiac, ophthalmic, and auditory defects and developmental delay. According to the ministry, between 2004 to 2009, there were 3,710 confirmed rubella cases and more than 95 per cent of these cases were found among children below 15 years of age. Of the 2,224 women of childbearing age tested for rubella, 2,020 were sero-positive. According to Nepal Health Demographic Survey-2011, about 13 per cent children are deprived of measles vaccination. Nnnn BANK FRAUD INCREASING Kathmandu, 14 Jan.:: Pramila Shah would have never realised that her household help had used her ATM card to withdraw money from her account, had she not received an SMS alert from her bank, Dikshya Singh writes in The hImalayan Times.. The 58 year-old retired school teacher got an SMS alert from her bank that Rs 1000 had been withdrawn from her account when she was at home. After an inquiry it was later revealed that her household help had withdrawn the amount from her ATM card and was testing waters by withdrawing a small amount. The help knew that she kept her card in her handbag and had saved the PIN number in her mobile. The simple alert service provided by the bank had saved her from bearing further losses. As the number of card frauds have risen in the recent past, signing up for a bank’s SMS alert can be the safest and simplest way to deal with probable cases of debit card and ATM card frauds. Most of the banks provide SMS alert service — either free of charge or at nominal service fee. “The instant notification makes bank customers aware that their account has been accessed and if the transaction is unauthorised then the customer can inform the bank and prevent more cases,” said Biswas Dhakal, president of F1Soft International. Debit cards issued by Himalayan Bank, NIC Bank and Ace Development Bank have been taken off transaction due to large-scale unauthorised withdrawal of money from the accounts using counterfeit cards. The case is under investigation but former staff of the bank are suspected to have stolen the information of the debit cards from the bank and used it to withdraw money randomly in India. The bank is suspected to have lost more than Rs five million — the actual loss to the bank is yet to be assessed as it took the bank a while to figure out the theft. The absconding former employee of Himalayan Bank — Anil Bhakta Suwal — who was found to have siphoned Rs 56.7 million while settling MasterCard and Visa accounts receivable is suspected to be involved in this case also. Along with the increment in the number of card users in the last few years, instances of card frauds have also gone up. The easiest and most popular fraud is cloning or skimming of the cards. The thieves use a machine called skimmer that easily copies the information on the magnetic strip of ATM cards and later that information is transferred to another blank card and used to transfer money. Last year, Metropolitan Police Crime Division arrested two brothers — Sabin and Ritesh Rimal — who were involved in withdrawing hefty amounts by duplicating ATM cards. Police had seized data encoding machines, an ID card printer and some blank ATM cards that were used to duplicate cards. Likewise, in 2011, police had also nabbed a racket that was running ATM card duplication scam that used similar skimmers and printers to create fake cards. “The technology required for skimming is pretty cheap so anyone can start it, that is why most of the banks are switching to EMV or chip-based cards that makes cloning difficult,” said manager of Card Operations at Nabil Bank Niraj Sharma. “Mandatory SMS alert and forced PIN change is the basic step we ask card holders to follow for better security,” he added. Nepal Rastra Bank has also asked banks to switch to chip-based cards to enhance security features. Moreover, Nepal’s mobile banking portals have also been targeted by fraudsters that operate phishing scams. Phishing refers to a swindling method that is used to gather personal and financial information falsely by claiming to be a legitimate enterprise — in this case — banks. The personal information thus gathered is used to transfer or withdraw money from the bank accounts and credit cards. “To deal with such cases, two-factor authentication system that requires users to have a PIN number along with a One Time Password is a must so that no one except the user can access the account,” pointed out Dhakal. nnnn