OLB

OLB is a German bank with its headquarters located in Germany. As a bank, it provides core banking services to its customers, which include the issuance of payment cards. The institution offers Mastercard debit cards to its customers. Its services are delivered through a network of branches and digital channels typical for retail banks in Germany. OLB operates within the German financial sector, serving customers who rely on its payment and account management solutions.

In August 2019, OLB experienced a fraud incident in which criminals cloned EMV chip-and-PIN debit cards issued to approximately two thousand of its customers. The cloned cards were used with counterfeit terminals to withdraw funds, resulting in a loss of about 1.5 million euros for the bank. OLB reimbursed all affected customers, blocked the compromised Mastercard debit cards, and initiated a full replacement of the affected cards. The bank attributed the incident to organized cybercrime involving counterfeit payment instruments and denied any internal security breach. It noted that the fraud was likely facilitated by stolen magnetic stripe data obtained through ATM or point‑of‑sale skimming devices. OLB highlighted the challenge of detecting such fraud, pointing to simultaneous transactions in distant locations as a potential indicator of cloned card activity.