Intelligence services have identified anywhere from 13 to 19 e-commerce entities which have defrauded customers and merchants of thousands of crores of taka, as per reports provided to a Digital Commerce Cell (DCC).

"We have received the reports from different intelligence departments of the government, which includes the Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit," said AHM Shafiquzzaman, DCC chief and an additional secretary of the commerce ministry.

"We will reveal the findings of the reports at a briefing tomorrow at the commerce ministry," he told The Daily Star over the phone yesterday.

The DCC, formed by the ministry in February following a surge in complaints, is scheduled to hold its second meeting today to discuss relevant issues.

Declining to state exactly how much money the agencies found to have been swindled, Shafiquzzaman said they were working on the details and would reveal all figures in the press briefing.

The final figures will also be provided in a report to Bangladesh Bank on Thursday to find ways to recover the money from the entities, he said.

The central bank is yet to provide an investigation report sought by the ministry last month on the amount swindled, said another additional secretary, Hafizur Rahman.

A preliminary probe of the ministry found 10 to 12 entities engaged in the malpractice, which involves taking payments in advance and then not making deliveries.

The actual figures can be known once the central bank submits the report, said Rahman.

He said Bangladesh Bank sought the ministry's opinion on how to return customers advance payments that remained stuck in payment gateways after some errant e-commerce platforms failed to deliver goods.

"We are preparing our opinion," Rahman told The Daily Star over the phone.

Commerce Minister Tipu Munshi at a press conference in his secretariat office on October 25 said the central bank would pay back consumers and merchants within the next three years the Tk 214 crore stuck in the payment gateways.

Since July 1 this year, the gateways have been keeping advance payments in escrow accounts as per a directive of Bangladesh Bank in response to the rising number of complaints.

Escrow is the use of a third party, which holds an asset or funds before they are transferred from one party to another. The third party holds the funds until both parties have fulfilled their contractual requirements.

The government is working on the return mechanism, said Munshi.

Regarding transactions prior to July 1, the minister said the money was taken by owners of some errant e-commerce companies as the escrow accounts were not in place then.