A portion of the US$2.5 million transferred by the Treasury to scammers following a breach of the computer system at the Ministry of Finance has been traced to a bank account in the state of Delaware, United States, a senior police officer said.
The account was in the name of a Delaware-based company engaged in registering online businesses and was maintained at a branch of TD Bank in that state, the official involved in the investigation said.
He further stated that it is not yet clear how much of the US$2.5 million was transferred into that specific account, adding that it was not the full amount. “The money had gone into more than one account,” he said.
The information came to light after the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL) contacted the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and requested assistance. The Criminal Investigation Department (CID), which is also involved in the investigation alongside the FIU, has been sharing available information with both the FBI and Australian authorities.
The US$2.5 million in question was intended as part of a bilateral loan repayment to Australia but was diverted into a fraudulent account after Finance Ministry email systems were hacked, according to the government.
The Australian Federal Police are also assisting Sri Lankan authorities in the investigation into the loss of funds.
They have requested details of the email exchanges that led to the transfer of money to the fraudulent account, the official said.
Meanwhile, the Committee on Public Finance (COPF) has stated in a report that the Treasury’s debt service payment process operates through a fully digitised system with no physical documentation or signatures, with authority delegated solely to relevant officials.
The COPF, which convened a closed-door meeting on Tuesday (April 30) regarding the fraudulent ten transactions amounting to US$2.5 million, also noted that the Public Debt Management Office (PDMO) Back-Office Director responsible for debt service functions has the authority to approve all foreign debt service payments from the Consolidated Fund.
The COPF meeting, chaired by Samagi Jana Balawegaya Parliamentarian Harsha de Silva, included testimony from Treasury Secretary Harshana Suriyapperuma, along with senior officials from the Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development, the Department of External Resources, the PDMO, and the Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL).
The Treasury Operations Department (TOD), which is functionally responsible for cash flows from the Consolidated Fund, is copied in debt service payment confirmations. However, it is not required to confirm or provide final authorisation for payments, the committee found.
The newly established Public Debt Management Office (PDMO) centralised functions that were previously distributed among the Public Debt Department (PDD) of the CBSL, the External Resources Department (ERD), and the Public Enterprises Department (PED) of the Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development.
In mid-January 2026, the Finance Ministry was alerted to suspicious cyber activity related to its foreign debt repayment process involving a bilateral creditor country, which was indicated to be India, the committee noted.
During the final transitional period of the debt management process from September 2025 to January this year, CBSL officials informed the committee that at least two transactions with incomplete information were rejected by their systems.
Prior to the establishment of the PDMO, the External Resources Department (ERD) handled all responsibilities related to bilateral and multilateral debt management, including receiving invoices from creditors, processing payment instructions in its back office, and forwarding them to the CBSL’s Public Debt Department (PDD).
The PDD would verify the payment instructions and forward them to the Finance Department of the CBSL, which would then send confirmation to the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) for processing through the Payments Department of the CBSL.
