Cybercriminals have a diverse arsenal, says expert
A cybersecurity expert has warned that criminals pose financial threats in many different ways.
Dr Rattipong Putthacharoen, a system engineer at CLM Symantec, said this week the range includes trojans launched against online banking transactions to attacks on ATMs.
While 2015 saw an increase in attacks against corporations, 2016 witnessed a spike in attacks on financial institutions.
They included a series of high-value heists targeting customers of the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (Swift).
While there is no evidence of such high-cost robberies on Swift clients so far this year, those in 2016 saw several institutions lose millions of dollars to cyber-criminals and state-supported hackers such as the so-called Lazarus group.
On average, 38 per cent of financial threats detected in 2016 were “found in large business locations”, Rattipong said.
“Most of these infection attempts were not targeted attacks, but were instead due to widespread email campaigns. Although we have seen a 36-per-cent decrease in detection numbers for financial malware in 2016, this is mainly due to earlier detection in the attack chain and more focused attacks.”
