18 - 21 May 2003 International Banking Security Association (IBSA) held its regular 44th General Membership Meeting. Hosted this year by Sberbank, the Meeting opened on 19th May at Sberbank's Central Head Office in Moscow. 
Established in 1981 in the US, IBSA is amongst the most authoritative international non- profit organisations in banking security business. IBSA enjoys observer status at the International Criminal Police Organisation (Interpol), works in close co-operation with the World Customs Organisation and law enforcement authorities from many countries. IBSA totals 48 members, among them major banks and financial institutions from 24 countries including HBSC Holdings plc, JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank AG, ABN AMRO Bank, UBS AG. Sberbank is the only Russian bank that gained accession to the Association. Sberbank has been participating in IBSA proceedings as a voting member since 1994. This year, the meeting was attended by more than fifty participants, including IBSA voting members, candidates for membership and observers.
 The major objectives of the Association include prevention and investigation of crimes against credit and finance institutions, international counterfeits and frauds, and provision of banking security on a global scale.
 Sberbank's long-standing co-operation with Association members has proved to be very useful for all parties involved and has convincingly shown that the mechanisms currently in place are really efficient. With assistance from the Association members, Sberbank has been successfully preventing its customers from considerable financial loss. On its part, Sberbank has been extending assistance to its foreign partners in helping them return millions of dollars fraudulently misappropriated earlier from customer accounts, to their rightful owners.
 Being a member of IBSA Sberbank has all the means to make full use of the existing opportunities to counter international fraud in the banking sector. This gains particular importance in view of the FATF decision to remove Russian Federation from the FATF 'black list' of countries that fail to combat money laundering. Among the factors that contributed to this decision was the success of Sberbank's co-operation with its IBSA partners.

Sberbank Press Service