Only a very, very small number of our two million accounts were impacted, but we took the precaution of canceling additional card accounts to be safe.

Our accounts are continually monitored, and when we saw what we considered suspicious activity, we immediately invalidated the cards and issued new cards. The account holders will begin getting the new cards on Monday.

If we even suspect that fraudulent activity could take place, we close those cards to protect those customers. While it's a very, very small number of people that are actually affected by fraud, we cast a wider net.

We regret any inconvenience this may have caused some of our customers.

This is a continuation of what we experienced last week.

We have been advised of suspect transactions on a small number of Bank of New Zealand customer accounts which suggest that fraudulent transactions were conducted offshore.