Exclusive - Online bank-theft software grows more sophisticated

[dipsydoodle]

(Reuters) - Two of the most pervasive and dangerous types of software for stealing money from bank accounts have been improved and can now transfer money out automatically, without a hacker's supervision, researchers said.

The latest variants of the widespread SpyEye and Zeus programs have already stolen as much as 13,000 Euros at a time from a single account and are in the early stages of deployment, according to investigators at Trend Micro Inc, a Japan-based security company that has many banks as customers.

Trend Micro Vice President Tom Kellerman told Reuters that his company's researchers had seen the new attacks on a dozen financial institutions in Germany, the United Kingdom and Italy. That is troubling because European banks generally have greater technology defenses than those in the United States, and Kellerman said it is "inevitable" that the variants will cross the Atlantic.

The new code has the potential to dramatically escalate the amount being stolen from accounts and a years-old arms race between the banks and criminal groups that are often based in Eastern Europe.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/06/18/uk-online-bankfraud-idUKBRE85H0D620120618

[norhdral]

1. Great post

you have shared a very useful post!!

[rfranklin]

2. Is it possible to put a block on these transactions?

You can block your credit report to prevent people from opening accounts in your name. I wonder if you can do the same with your bank account.

[dipsydoodle]

3. Only by locking yourself out of use of your bank account online.

.

[rfranklin]

4. No problem...I don't even have a debit card...

I use credit cards to limit the amount that I could lose.

[Art_from_Ark]

5. The Reuters article is somewhat confusing

At first, it seems to say that European banks are being directly targeted by this malware. However, later it mentions the Windows operating system as being widely used on personal computers. But the banks don't use personal computers to do online banking-- they use servers and mainframes, which are generally protected by several layers of anti-hacking software. So it would actually appear that this malware is actually targeting the computers of individuals, rather than institutions.