The Australian High Commission in Sri Lanka has confirmed that both the mission and Sri Lanka’s Ministry of Finance are aware of irregularities in payments owed to the Australian Government.
Sri Lankan authorities have launched an investigation into the matter and are coordinating closely with Australian officials, who are assisting the inquiry, the Australian High Commission said in a statement on ‘X’.
The High Commission further said that Australia remains committed to supporting Sri Lanka’s path toward debt sustainability.
The statement comes after Deputy Minister of Finance Dr Anil Jayantha announced that complaints have been filed with law enforcement agencies following a cyber theft incident involving unauthorised access to the computer system of the Department of External Resources under the Ministry of Finance.
He said the incident occurred during communication and fund settlement activities between the Australian Export Finance Agency and the Treasury, where both parties exchanged information via email.
Hackers allegedly exploited this communication channel to manipulate the information exchange,he said, adding that the fraud came to light after a similar attempt was made to obtain additional funds linked to a payment due to India.
He further said that suspicion arose when changes were detected in account numbers. Following this, the Treasury immediately alerted the Sri Lanka Police Computer Crimes Investigation Division and the Sri Lanka Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT), after which a lengthy investigation was then carried out tracing communications back to the start of discussions on debt restructuring and repayments.
This established that money intended for the Australian Export Finance Agency had been diverted into accounts controlled by the hackers. A complaint has since been filed with the Criminal Investigation Department (CID), and investigations are ongoing, Deputy Minister of Finance Dr Anil Jayantha added. (Newswire)