HSBC boosts safety boxes’ security

HONG KONG: HSBC has introduced stricter rules for the use of safety-deposit boxes in Hong Kong, which customers use to store valuables but which are at risk of being abused for money laundering and terrorism financing.

Safety boxes offer clients who lease them the possibility to store items such a jewels, art or any other valuable in a private and highly secure place, for instance a bank´s vault.

"The nature of a safe deposit locker means it has the potential for misuse for criminal purposes," HSBC, Hong Kong's biggest bank, said in an emailed statement in on Monday. "We have introduced several clauses to the conditions of lease for safe lockers to further strengthen our defences against financial crime and to enable us to co-operate with law enforcement agencies when required."

HSBC, which is also Europe´s biggest bank by assets, did not elaborate on the changes that it was introducing or whether the new terms were being changed elsewhere.

But it said the new, stricter rules, would apply also to old-time customers who started to lease the safety locker before December 18, 2014.A report commissioned by the federal government of Switzerland highlighted in December how in certain circumstances safety boxes can be vulnerable to financial crimes.