Fraud Ring In Hacking Attack On 60 Banks - At Least $75 Million Stolen - could be as Much as $2.5 Billion
Fraud Ring In Hacking
Attack On 60 Banks
Some 60m euro is stolen
from bank accounts in a massive cyber raid, after fraudsters raid dozens of
banks around the world.
7:16am UK, Wednesday 27
June 2012
By Pete Norman, Sky News
Online
Sixty million euro has
been stolen from bank accounts in a massive cyber bank raid after fraudsters
raided dozens of financial institutions around the world.
According to a joint
report by software security firm McAfee and Guardian Analytics, more than 60
firms have suffered from what it has called an "insider level of
understanding".
"The fraudsters' objective
in these attacks is to siphon large amounts from high balance accounts, hence
the name chosen for this research - Operation High Roller," the report
said.
"If all of the
attempted fraud campaigns were as successful as the Netherlands example we describe
in this report, the total attempted fraud could be as high as 2bn euro
(£1.6bn)."
The automated malicious
software programme was discovered to use servers to process thousands of
attempted thefts from both commercial firms and private individuals.
The stolen money was then
sent to so-called mule accounts in caches of a few hundreds and 100,000 euro
(£80,000) at a time.
Credit unions, large
multinational banks and regional banks have all been attacked.
Sky News defence and
security editor Sam Kiley said: "It does include British financial
institutions and has jumped over to North America and South America.
"What they have done
differently from routine attacks is that they have got into the bank servers and
constructed software that is automated.
"It can get around
some of the mechanisms that alert the banking system to abnormal
activity."
The details of the global
fraud come just a day after the MI5 boss warned of the new cyber security
threat to UK business.
McAfee researchers have
been able to track the global fraud, which still continues, across countries
and continents.
"They have identified
60 different servers, many of them in Russia, and they have identified one
alone that has been used to steal 60m euro," Kiley said.
"There are dozens of
servers still grinding away at this fraud – in effect stealing money."
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