Bank of Valletta said that over the past few days a number of customers received a fraudulent e-mail purporting to be from the bank asking them to visit an indicated website "to re-activate their online services".

The e-mail was sent through a technique known as Phishing - a form of online fraud and identity theft in which a malicious third party attempts to try to persuade customers to visit a counterfeit bank website in order to steal identity data and financial information, the bank said. Such sites are designed to mimic authentic bank websites so as to lure the visitor into thinking that s/he is actually logged on to the bank's genuine site.

The bank said it has taken immediate steps to disable the fraudulent website linked to the e-mails.

It reminder customers that it will never request 24x7 login credentials, pins or credit card details through e-mail, telephone or other means of communication.

There could be more scams in the future to lure customers into surrendering such information to a third party. The bank said that customers should remember never to follow links directly from e-mails but to type the bank's url - www.bov.com - on their web browser when they wish to visit the BOV website.

The Bank of Valletta SecureKey provides internet banking customers with a secure authentication mechanism. However, the bank advised, customers should always be vigilant and observe standard information security precautions. These include never writing down or disclosing the pin number to anyone under any circumstances.

For more information, customers can contact Customer Service Centre on 21312020.