LONDON, Sept 20 (Reuters) - Eight men have been arrestedover the alleged theft of 1.3 million pounds ($2.1 million) bytaking control of a Barclays branch computer system, ina "rapidly evolving" field of cyber crime, British police saidon Friday.
The men are accused of stealing the money by using ahardware device attached to a computer at the bank's SwissCottage branch in London after posing as engineers. BarclaysSecurity reported a loss of the same amount in April.
The arrests follow a similar incident earlier in September,when 12 members of a gang who had attempted to take control ofthe bank Santander UK's computer systems were arrested,accused of trying to steal millions of pounds.
"This new and increasing methodology being seen by UK lawenforcement demonstrates the rapidly evolving nature of lowrisk, high financial yield cyber enabled crime," theMetropolitan Police said in a statement.
The arrests, in connection with an allegation of conspiracyto steal from Barclays Bank and conspiracy to defraud Britishbanks, were made by the Metropolitan Police's Central e-CrimeUnit in London on Thursday and Friday.
Barclays were able to recover a significant amount of thestolen cash, the police said.