MUSCAT: The Central Bank of Oman (CBO) has temporarily suspended the country’s online payment gateway service ‘OmanNet’ after it suffered a security breach that have affected users from making transactions online.
In a statement issued on Friday, CBO said it found some “unauthorised attempts” made in the past few hours to enter the portal and the issue is being investigated.
OmanNet is a national debit card payment gateway infrastructure for e-commerce transactions.
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CBO said since the network is suspended, customers can use the option to “pay with credit or other cards” if the option is available until the service is restored. “Our technical team is working to resolve the issue,” the statement said.
ATMs and mobile online money transfer working smoothly
However, CBO has clarified that other electronic financial services such as ATM, online transfer from one account to another account, and point of sale devices (POS) are working smoothly.
On Thursday evening, many users shared screenshots of the message they received while attempting to make payment online.
Earlier, speaking to The Arabian Stories, an official from Ministry of Technology and Communications, said authorities are working to restore the payment platform soon. “We have temporarily suspended the services through the gateway and we are working to resolve the issue. There seems to be a breach ,” he said.
Meanwhile, in a statement issued online, Bank Muscat has urged customers to continue using their debit cards for e-commerce transactions on local sites and applications. “Please select the ‘Credit and Other Cards’ option instead of ‘Oman Debit Cards’ option,” the statement said.
