FINANCIAL institutions here must obey strict rules to keep their clients' information confidential.
Revealing details such as bank statements, even by accident, could mean they have breached banking-secrecy provisions under the Banking Act, lawyers said.
Lawyer Amolat Singh, managing partner of Amolat and Partners, said that banks have a duty under the Banking Act to keep their clients' details strictly private and confidential.
'Section 47 of the Banking Act says that any person with records from a bank should not divulge the information,' he said, adding that unintended disclosures would also breach banking- secrecy laws.
'Even on the Internet, banks should set up checks to ensure that technical faults would not accidentally reveal online client information,' said Mr Singh.
Mr Ganesh Balasingham, a consultant with law firm Colin Ng and Partners, said the banking authorities would be concerned about any form of wilful or negligent disclosure of confidential client details.
'The severity of the penalty for breaching the regulations depends on the extent of disclosure,' said Mr Balasingham.
Individuals who break the law face a fine of up to $125,000, a jail term of up to three years, or both.
Corporations could be fined up to $250,000.
The lawyers' comments came in the wake of a technical error in Swiss bank UBS' computer systems, which allowed a few of its private-banking clients here and in Hong Kong to see other people's online-banking data.
UBS took swift measures to address the issue and informed the banking authorities, even though the disclosed information did not include clients' names.
The Hong Kong Monetary Authority told my paper on Monday that the territory's Code of Banking Practice also states that banks should treat their current and former customers' banking affairs as private and confidential.
In 2004, bank statements were mistakenly faxed by UOB bank clients to a member of the public. Lawyers had said then that leaking such information was a serious issue.
