Sverdlovsk Region’s division of the Russian Federation Federal Security Service did not offer any license allowing OOO Inbank to use or distribute any cryptographic aids,’ the division’s press secretary Anna Lastovetskaya informed UrBC.

In the meantime, Inbank (formerly known as OOO Uran) keeps testing its Internet-Bank system for the last month and uses it to handle the payments of its private and business customers. Under the current legislation, such services must be licensed.

‘The Federal Act 128 on licensing states that banking activity falls under the provisions described in Article 17 (parts 5, 6, and 7). These are the provisions we take into account when issuing licenses for use of information security cryptographic aids,’ Lastovetskaya said.

‘In case OOO Inbank handles the sort of information that needs to be protected cryptographically, through an electronic digital seal, for example, it must have a license allowing the company to perform such services. Even if the bank only offers these services to one person, it still needs a license, no matter how many or how few customers it has. We never issued such a license either to OOO Inbank or OOO Uran. Nor do we have any record of other divisions of the Federal Security Service issuing the license to the bank,’ Anna Lastovetskaya explained.

Inbank’s BOD Member Andrei Frolov was unable to provide UralBusinessConsulting Agency of Information and Analytics with any comments on the issue.