March 8, 2013
Translated by Chen Min

Some of China's largest commercial banks have begun to investigate savings accounts that may have been set-up with false identity papers or anonymously, according to a report in today's Beijing News.

The report said that several banks had begun a process of verifying the personal information of individuals who have RMB-denominated savings accounts.

The internal investigations are said to focus on bank accounts that were opened before Jun 30, 2007 and those that were established without an ID card.

The newspaper reported that Bank of China, China Construction Bank, China Merchants Bank and China Everbright Bank were all conducting such investigations. Different banks are said to deal with unverified accounts in different ways, with some banks choosing to freeze funds or close accounts if they can't be verified.

The impetous for the investigation appears to be guidelines issued by the central bank in late 2011 requiring banks to gradually start working on the verification of personal information of bank account holders. The central bank said that banks should complete the verification task by the end of 2013.

The article says that the investigation will help to reduce the amount of corruption, fraud and other financial crime as fake and anonymous bank accounts are often used in these kinds of crimes.

According to staff at some banks in Beijing, 70 percent of verification work should be done by the end of June, and the aim is to complete the task before the end of December.

Banks suggest that account holders should check up on their old bank accounts to see whether they are still active.

Although the investigation aims to deal with fake and anonymous bank accounts, it's likely that some mistakes will be made.

Links and Sources
The Beijing News: 虚假匿名银行账户年底或被冻结