500 k lifted in bitcoins by malware? cyber theft on the rise

[strollingbones]

Everybody's been wondering who hacked Bitcoin investor Allinvain's digital wallet and lifted nearly half a million dollars' worth of the virtual currency this week. A recent discovery by a poster on the Symantec forums recently found out that it might actually not be a who, but a what. According to some source code discovered on an underground forum, a type of malware known as a Trojan horse scans for and steals digital wallet files off of unsuspecting computers. Hackers build and run similar programs to steal credit card numbers stored on hard drives, except stealing Bitcoins is much more lucrative because, like cash, once the wallet is missing, the money is gone for good.

Bitcoin Heist May Be Victim of New Moneygrubbing Malware - Yahoo! News

i have considered investing in bitcoins...esp since they have tripled in value.....o my....my bad

 

[editec]

Such events continue to be the argument against a CASHLESS SOCIETY.

 

[zzzz]

I wish they would start developing programs that upon determining a virus or malware attempt from a source would actively initiate an attack on its own and permanently disable the sending source. Something like attacking fire with fire. If all the computers had this program then anyone initiating a virus or Trojan horse would be disabled. Probably never happen and until a bot is created that can get ahead in the virus/TH/Malware game and create and recognize new threats things like this will continue to happen.

Best thing is to keep your stuff insulated by storing on a dockable medium and accessing it when you need it. Sort of like a wallet. Don't keep it on the hard drive.

 

[waltky]

Obama gettin' stern with China over cybertheft...

US seeks 'serious' action by China on cybertheft
Mar 11,`13 WASHINGTON (AP) -- The White House called Monday for "serious steps" by China to stop cybertheft, which it described as intolerable to the international community.

National Security adviser Tom Donilon's comments reflect growing concern in Washington over the security risk posed by cyber intrusions and the economic costs for America. Donilon said U.S. businesses are increasingly speaking out about cyber theft of confidential business information and proprietary technologies emanating from China "on a very large scale." He said Beijing "should take serious steps to investigate and put a stop to these activities" and recognize the risk it poses to international trade and to U.S.-China relations. "The international community cannot afford to tolerate such activity from any country," Donilon told the Asia Society in New York.

He called for China to engage in a constructive dialogue with the U.S. to establish "acceptable norms of behavior in cyberspace." Donilon was speaking about the Obama administration's strategic commitment to greater U.S. engagement in Asia. He said that despite reductions in the defense budget, the U.S. would sustain efforts to "rebalance" to the region as it winds down its military involvement in the Middle East. He stressed the importance of constructive relations with Beijing, where Communist Party leader Xi Jinping is due to be anointed as China's new president this week. He said that transition presented opportunities to deepen cooperation. Donilon said diplomatic relations were good but military dialogue needed improving to prevent the risk of accidental conflict.

The growing concern over cyber intrusions from China threaten to strain U.S. relations with Beijing, which views the U.S. rebalance as an attempt to contain its emergence as a global power. Last month, U.S.-based cybersecurity firm, Mandiant, issued a report accusing a secret Chinese military unit in Shanghai of years of cyberattacks against more than 140 companies, a majority of them American. Days later, the Obama administration announced new efforts to fight the growing theft of American trade secrets. The Chinese government denied being involved in cybertheft, and contended that its country has also been a victim of hacking, much of it traced to the United States.

Source

 

[waltky]

Granny don't use an ATM card, she always pays cash...

ATM thieves conducted massive cyberattack
Thursday, May 9,`13 - A global posse of cyberthieves, armed with laptops in place of guns, hacked into financial institutions and stole $45 million from automated teller machines in a first-of-its-kind heist made for the 21st century, authorities in New York said Thursday.

Over a seven-month period ending last month, the authorities said, hackers broke into computer networks of financial companies in the United States and India and eliminated the withdrawal limits on prepaid debit cards. Then, people involved in the heist withdrew tens of millions of dollars from ATMs in Manhattan and more than 20 other places around the world. In one case, surveillance cameras picked up a member of the “cashing crew” going from machine to machine, his cash-stuffed bag growing bigger with each hit.

In unsealing an indictment Thursday against eight men accused of helping to orchestrate the looting, the authorities described an underworld of cybercrime that they said was a burgeoning threat in the Internet age. “This was a 21st-century bank heist that reached through the Internet and spanned the globe,” said Loretta E. Lynch, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York. “Moving literally at the speed of the Internet, the organization made its way from the computer systems of international corporations to the streets of New York.”

A woman looks at a map showing where eight members belonging to a New York-based cell of a global cyber criminal organization withdrew money from ATM machines, during a news conference.

Banks, not individual ATM users, were harmed. But the heist reinforced fears that new payment systems — such as those being built into smartphones — raise a variety of new risks for consumers. “New technologies and the rapid growth of the Internet have eliminated the traditional borders of financial crimes and provided new opportunities for the criminal element to threaten the world’s financial systems,” said Steven Hughes, special agent in charge of the Secret Service office in New York.

According to the indictment, the eight defendants — mostly men in their mid-20s and all residents of Yonkers, about a half-hour north of Manhattan — carried out the New York-based part of the fraud. Seven of them were arrested in recent weeks. An eighth man was reportedly slain last month in the Dominican Republic. The authorities dubbed the heist an “unlimited operation” because hackers eliminated the withdrawal limits of debit cards. According to the indictment, the efforts began in October. The masterminds of the scheme — whose identities or locations, if known, were not disclosed — breached an Indian firm that processes credit card transactions for MasterCard debit cards issued by Rakbank, an institution in the United Arab Emirates. These hackers attempted to either dramatically increase or eliminate withdrawal limits.

MORE

 

[waltky]

Dat's why Granny keeps her money inna secret hidy place so' dem cyberrobbers can't get to it...

Germany arrests two Dutch citizens in cyber bank heist
10 May`13 - German prosecutors said on Friday they had arrested two Dutch citizens suspected of taking part in a $45 million global cyber heist unveiled the previous day by U.S. authorities.

A 35-year-old man and a 56-year-old woman were caught on February 19 withdrawing 170,000 euros ($220,500) in Düsseldorf using Bank of Muscat credit cards. In total, $2.4 million dollars was withdrawn in seven German cities, the prosecutors said. On Thursday, U.S. prosecutors said an international criminal gang had stolen $45 million from two Middle Eastern banks by hacking into credit card processing firms and withdrawing money from cash machines in 27 countries. The ringleaders of the global operation were believed to be outside the United States but U.S. prosecutors have declined to give details, citing the continuing investigation. Germany is the only other country so far to announce arrests.

A spokesman for the Düsseldorf prosecutor's office said the two Dutch people under arrest had come to Düsseldorf with the purpose of withdrawing money in Germany. The two suspects are accused of computer fraud and faking credit cards. Germany's banking association, BdB, said it was not aware of any banks in Germany suffering losses as a result of the scheme. In the complaint on Thursday, the U.S. Justice Department accused eight men of withdrawing $2.4 million from 3,000 bank cash machines in New York in the space of 10 hours in February. The Department said seven of the men have been arrested.

Charts showing information related to eight members belonging to a New York-based cell of a global cyber criminal organization are displayed at a news conference in New York

Dominican police on Friday confirmed that the eighth, Alberto Lajud-Pena, allegedly the leader of the New York cell, was killed in the Dominican Republic on April 27. Lajud-Pena was shot dead in a robbery at a house in the town of San Francisco de Macoris, about 100 miles northeast of Santo Domingo, local police said. Investigators found $100,000 in cash in the house, as well as an M-16 assault rifle, two 9 mm pistols, a revolver, ammunition clips and a telescopic sight. It was not clear if the killing or the money were related to the cyber thefts.

According to the Justice Department, the hackers allegedly increased the available balance and withdrawal limits on prepaid MasterCard debit cards issued by Bank of Muscat of Oman, and National Bank of Ras Al Khaimah PSC (RAKBANK) of the United Arab Emirates. They then distributed counterfeit debit cards to "cashers" around the world, enabling them to siphon millions of dollars from cash machines in a matter of hours, the complaint said. National Bank of Ras Al Khaimah (RAKBANK) said on Friday the fraud against it took place at the end of last year and resulted in losses of around $4.7 million for the United Arab Emirates-based lender.

More Germany arrests two Dutch citizens in cyber bank heist

 

[waltky]

Global cyber crime on the rise...

World grapples with rise in cyber crime
May 11,`13 -- International law enforcement agencies say the recent $45 million dollar ATM heist is just one of many scams they're fighting in an unprecedented wave of sophisticated cyberattacks.

Old-school robberies by masked criminals are being eclipsed by stealth multimillion dollar cybercrime operations which are catching companies and investigators by surprise. "We are seeing an unprecedented number of cyberscams that include phishing for financial data, viruses, credit card fraud and others," Marcin Skowronek, an investigator at Europol's European Cybercrime Center in The Hague said on Saturday. "In Europe, we are generally quite well protected against some types of fraud because of the chip and pin technology we use, but there are still shops and machines around the world who still take cards without chips. And the most popular destinations for this type of fraud are the United States and the Dominican Republic."

U.S. Investigators said Thursday a gang hit cash machines in 27 countries in two attacks - the first netting $5 million in December and then $40 million in February in a 10-hour spree that involved about 36,000 transactions. Hackers got into bank databases, eliminated withdrawal limits on prepaid debit cards and created access codes. Others loaded that data onto any plastic card - even a hotel keycard - with a magnetic stripe. A similar scam yielded some 50 arrests this year in Europe during a joint police operation between Romanian police and Europol, Skowronek said.

The operation took more than a year, involved some 400 police officers across Europe and required work comparing bank losses to illegal transactions and then cross-referencing suspects, said Skowronek, who said many national police forces were beefing up their undercover work in the cyberworld to catch criminals. Investigators found illegal workshops for producing devices and software to manipulate point-of-sale terminals. Illegal electronic equipment, financial data, cloned cards and cash were seized in raids in Britain and Romania.

The group stole credit and debit card numbers and PIN codes by implanting card reading devices and malicious software on point-of-sale terminals. The criminals then used counterfeit payment cards with stolen data for further illegal transactions in countries that included Argentina, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Japan, Mexico, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Thailand and the United States.

MORE

 

[waltky]

Big ol' cybertheft...

Bangladesh: 20 foreign suspects identified in $101 million cyber heist
Tuesday 19th April, 2016 - Senior Bangladeshi investigators have confirmed that they have identified 20 foreigners involved in one of the largest cyber heists in history.

Officers announced in a statement that they had identified 12 Philippine nationals and eight Sri Lankans who were suspected to have been involved in the massive cyber heist of $101 million from the Bangladesh central bank’s account in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Unconfirmed reports also stated that some Chinese nationals have been identified by investigators too. The statement clarified that investigators had identified the suspects who appeared to have received some of the payments, and not the hackers.

The case unfolded on February 4 and 5 and witnessed hackers breaching Bangladesh Bank’s systems and trying to steal nearly $1 billion from its account at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Reports specified that most of the payments were blocked but $81 million was routed to accounts in the Philippines and diverted to casinos there. Another $20 million was sent to a company in Sri Lanka but the transfer was reversed because the hackers misspelled the name of the firm. It was this mistake that eventually led to their doom, raising a red flag at the routing bank.

Reports claimed that the Bangladeshi officials had submitted the details to Philippine and Sri Lankan authorities. Meanwhile, a Senate committee in the Philippines is said to be holding hearings into how the money stolen from the Bangladesh central bank wound up with two casinos and a junket operator in the country. Sri Lanka’s criminal police department on the other hand is also investigating the cyber theft.

Neither of the countries has commented on the report submitted by Bangladesh. Bangladeshi investigators are now probing whether there was a genuine negligence of central bank officials due to incompetence or there was a hidden criminal intent behind the lax online security.

Bangladesh 20 foreign suspects identified in 101 million cyber heist