Hacking, real danger or media hype?

bSlick · 08-10-2009 08:47PM #1

You often hear about the dangers of hacking and how hackers could steal money from bank accounts. Is this actually a real danger or is it just media hype? Whatever about actually hacking into a system, how in the name of god is a hacker supposed to wire funds from one bank account to another, and even if they managed that it's not going to be hard to catch them given that all the bank has to do is look at the destination account of the money.

So are any hackers out there actually making money by stealing it or do they only make money by selling hacked information and/or blackmail?

Martyr · 09-10-2009 01:00PM

Most profits are probably made from identity/credit card theft and the guys involved in that are not hackers, just your average common crook.

scams where the person being tricked into willingly transfer cash (419, lottery), these are still a problem today.

sites where you can buy/sell items are also a target for scammers.

it's hard to know if online banking sites are really secure because even if there were a breach, the prepetrator won't be quick to own up and the bank won't want it publicised.

but as you say, it would be a problem hiding money, then again, in some parts of the world, you have governments who don't care about their citizens scamming activities.

i'd guess there's almost a sense of national pride when they know they've scammed naive westerners out of millions, sorta like retribution

syklops · 09-10-2009 02:53PM

bSlick wrote: »

You often hear about the dangers of hacking and how hackers could steal money from bank accounts. Is this actually a real danger or is it just media hype? Whatever about actually hacking into a system, how in the name of god is a hacker supposed to wire funds from one bank account to another, and even if they managed that it's not going to be hard to catch them given that all the bank has to do is look at the destination account of the money.

So are any hackers out there actually making money by stealing it or do they only make money by selling hacked information and/or blackmail?

Why do you want to know?

The Russian mafia employ thousands of Hackers for a wide range of nefarious deeds, including spamming, blackmail, malware research, Identity theft, and a number of others. Do they make money? Yes. Alot.

Again, why do you want to know?

Martyr · 09-10-2009 04:15PM

syklops wrote:

The Russian mafia employ thousands of Hackers...

Forgive for asking, but where did you read that?
Because it sounds a little like the media hype bSlick is referring to.

Are there studies that indicate majority of cyber crime originates from Russia?
Crime perpetrated by hackers employed by the russian mafia?

I find that hard to believe, just because they're russian with less opportunity to make money from their skills, doesn't mean they're involved in computer crime.

There are just as many scams being run by individuals from Nigeria for example, they use computers yet are not considered hackers.

sounds more like prejudice to me.

Black Swan · 09-10-2009 05:43PM

Electronic-based hacking thefts are real, not media hype. One example: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/02/atm/ There are several other links embedded in this WIRED magazine article.

In a city not too far from where I live in So Cal there was a botnet master who was arrested and convicted by the US Justice Department. Link: http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/cybercrime/anchetaArrest.htm

Martyr · 09-10-2009 06:23PM

More than 130 ATMs in 49 cities from Moscow to Atlanta were hit simultaneously just after midnight Eastern Time on November 8.

And they have no suspects? ... even my local ATM has a camera.
Smells like BS to me, and it's Kevin Poulson reporting, which says alot.

Lisheo · 10-10-2009 08:03PM

The RBN, the Russian Business Network do employ hackers.
So does the Chinese Government. Most of the hackers you're talking about don't steal credit cards or any of that, really. They set up botnets and hire em out write malware They don't really steal money from bank accounts, or at least, not that much. If they did that, well, chances are they'd be hunted down.

Martyr · 10-10-2009 09:43PM

The RBN, the Russian Business Network do employ hackers.

RBN are not employing anyone right now and nobody has any evidence of who they employed, atleast none that i know of, but if you have any at all, please correct me.

Cybercrime is not predominantly a Russian problem, it's not unique to any one country in the world, it's a global problem which requires attention and co-operation from authorities in each country to combat.

The media, and in particular the american media, love to over-exaggerate cybercrime and point the finger of blame at adversaries Russia and China.

Of course there's plenty of malware coming from China and Russia, no-one would dispute this, but no more than what's being developed in North/South America and Europe.

These countries have large populations, much larger than US and Europe combined, and their methods of dealing with cybercrime are not as advanced as US/Europe, but it's progressing and will get better.

Let's not forget that the most prolific spammers were american...

I could rent a server tomorrow in Russia or China and start spamming email addresses in Ireland.

Does that mean russian/chinese hackers are responsible? of course not, but that's exactly what the media would report...it's more of an eye grabbing headline. "Russian hackers attack Irish email servers"

Just like the reports of DoS attack on eircom DNS, "Could the Russians have attacked eircom?" asks Joe Bloggs :rolleyes:

It's very poor journalism.

So does the Chinese Government.

So what if they do? Why is that such a problem? plenty of governments around the world employ hackers, i see nothing wrong with this.
But I guess it would depend on what you would define a "hacker"

Are you suggesting that China are responsible for stealing credit card numbers and peoples identities?

It's a gross generalisation and stereotypical comment based purely on prejudice.There's absolutely no evidence to suggest the chinese government are employing hackers for the purpose of robbing online bank accounts...it's ridiculous.

It's always 'The Russians' or 'The Chinese' :rolleyes:

A russian programmer can get paid just as much as a programmer in germany,spain, italy..etc

There are also plenty of freelance programmers who make a comfortable living doing work for overseas clients, all of it perfectly legal.

A guy i know works in ukraine as programmer and he's irish.
If he can get work there, why can't a ukrainian?

[-0-] · 11-10-2009 04:11PM

Oh it's real alright.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/02/06/greece_mobile_snooping_scandal/

Black Swan · 11-10-2009 04:55PM

Martyr wrote: »

And they have no suspects? ... even my local ATM has a camera.

"FBI releases pics of low-level suspects in $9m ATM scam Payroll card max-out multiplier hack." Link: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/02/06/atm_hack_scam/

Martyr wrote: »

Smells like BS to me, and it's Kevin Poulson reporting, which says alot.

There are several sources regarding this incident besides Poulson, including the corporation that was hacked (RBS WorldPay). Just Google.

There are also several sources regarding the below incident besides the US Justice Dept:

Blue_Lagoon wrote: »

In a city not too far from where I live in So Cal there was a botnet master who was arrested and convicted by the US Justice Department. Link: http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/cybercrime/anchetaArrest.htm

List of convicted computer criminals since 1983... Link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_convicted_computer_criminals ... but this list is obviously incomplete.

Dmitri Galushkevich was convicted in 2008 for DOS attack in Estonia. Link: http://www.pcworld.com/article/141730/student_convicted_in_attack_against_estonian_web_site.html

21 convictions reported in UK. Link: http://management.silicon.com/government/0,39024677,39452163,00.htm

This is but a small number of a large pool reported. There probably have been hundreds of recent cyber crime convictions (not news hype), but I don't have time to research them for you.

Martyr · 12-10-2009 02:03AM

[quote=[-0-]]Oh it's real alright.[/quote]

did you read that article? i did, and it mentioned that it was inside job by an
employee - perhaps he was working on behalf of someone, we may never know.

there's no mention of mobsters or hackers involved..just a company employee bugging the phones with software.

Blue Lagoon wrote:

There are several sources regarding this incident besides Poulson,
including the corporation that was hacked (RBS WorldPay). Just Google.

How do you know RBS didn't fabricate the story to cover up the real reason for the money missing?

130 ATMS, $9,000,000 taken.

So each individual withdrew an average of $69,230 ?
Would an ATM even have that much money in it?

And they only have 2 suspects..i just find it all hard to believe, that's all.
Perhaps it's true, but I seriously doubt that much was stolen..

Dmitri Galushkevich was convicted in 2008 for DOS attack in Estonia.

perfectly good example of where the media over-reacted, blaming a country..a whole nation
for performing a silly DoS attack when it was a lone student by himself the entire time.

same over-reactive response we seen when twitter got attacked and also eircom.

the media on occasion are known for reporting 'The Russians' or 'The Chinese' are hacking peoples computers, without any evidence and everybody believes it..it's truly the stuff of hollywood fantasy.

This is but a small number of a large pool reported. There probably have been hundreds of recent
cyber crime convictions (not news hype), but I don't have time to research them for you.

BL, i never disputed there was a problem with cybercrime.

But i think the OP was specifically asking about online bank fraud, not credit card fraud or identity theft.

The OP wanted to know if there were hackers stealing money from online bank accounts.

Black Swan · 12-10-2009 09:33AM

Martyr wrote: »

The OP wanted to know if there were hackers stealing money from online bank accounts.

Online banking fraud losses have increased sharply during the first six months of 2009 and now total £39 million - a 55 per cent increase from 2008... The increase was blamed on criminals using more technologically sophisticated ways to gain access to the online accounts of customers, such as banking trojans targeting PC vulnerabilities. Link: http://www.itpro.co.uk/616075/online-banking-fraud-increases-by-55-per-cent
Cyber-Thieves Steal $700K Via ATM Hacking. Link: http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/CyberThieves-Steal-700K-Via-ATM-Hacking/
Clampi Trojan... Once installed on a PC, the trojan quietly waits for you to visit a credit card or banking Web site. When it detects you're on one of the roughly 4,600 financial Web sites it's trained to watch, it records your username and password, and feeds that information back to the criminals. Source: http://www.switched.com/2009/09/22/clampi-virus-targets-users-at-banks-and-credit-card-sites/. Clampi has been notably successful at obtaining sensitive log-on information and enabling cyber criminals to empty bank accounts. Source: http://www.mxlogic.com/securitynews/identity-theft/clampi-virus-attacks-bank-transactions638.cfm
The rise of online banking and electronic money transfers has brought with it a new breed of criminals, malware and online financial scams. Thieves have developed elaborate cross-account, cross-channel and cross-institution schemes to transfer funds from compromised online accounts to controlled accounts. They disappear with the money before the illegal transfer is discovered. Link: http://www.verisign.co.uk/authentication/consumer-authentication/vip-fraud-detection-modules/money-transfer/index.html

Procasinator · 20-10-2009 04:14PM

FBI shut down a rather larger ring of phishers recently (who were targeting on-line banking):

http://www.itpro.co.uk/616069/the-fbi-cracks-the-largest-phishing-case-ever

It's a very real danger. It might not be as glorious or as high-tech as the media hype might make it out to be, but still very real.

Also, the Russian comment was not really one of prejudice. It is well known that Russia is large producer of malware and other "hacker" activities.

http://www.pctools.com/news/view/id/197/
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1012805/russia-becomes-malware-tczar
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10789_3-10086352-57.html

Could go on. The point being, Russia is one particular giant in "hacking" (of course, not the only one).

janchi · 20-10-2009 04:41PM

Hacking is more like a therm from early 90ties movies. Now it's based on my knowledge on Illegal intrusions run by Spyware, Spam Scams, Trojans, Fake Ware and other type of Malware.
Hacking was more like a direct intrusion in to other system - Network, Server or individual workstation using Back Door or Trojan Horse. To gain access, remotely operate or read and copy/delete data.

And about Russians.... They are more likely the Most advance Cyber Criminals. Running business in Millions of Dollars a year. But location of this groups is all over, from Egypt, China, to US. All depends on the group. But the main source of all the codes found are pointing to Russia. Deployment can be from anywhere.

It may be caused by low Enforcement Authority and Laws in the particular country, where the criminals are based.

Martyr · 20-10-2009 08:11PM

Lars Sobiraj: How does it come that so many enormously criminal Black Hats still can hide in Russia? In your opinion: why does the government of your country not take harder steps against those almost mafia-like structures?

Eugene Kaspersky: That's a common mistake that most hackers are based in Russia. In reality most hackers are based in China, and most malware is Chinese-based. The second source of hackers attacks comes from Spanish and Portuguese speaking countries (mostly from Latin America). The third source is Russian speaking countries - not just Russia alone, but Baltic, Ukraine, Kazakhstan as well. Russians are more visible on the malware scene not because of their numbers, but because Russian-based malware is usually much more effective and complicated. That's why many Russian hackers develop malware and botnets by request - and then sell this malware to cyber criminals based in the rest of the world - Americas, Europe, Asia, Australia.

read interview

Procasinator · 21-10-2009 09:26AM

Maybe you mean to, but if not: that only goes further to show our point that a) Russia is a large (as well as places like Ukraine) in the hacker/malware scene, and b) they produce "quality"/ are advanced

janchi · 21-10-2009 10:34AM

Russian Attacks are effective... That's the reason why everybody mentioning Russia. Most resources, skilled programers, big background support.

Kaspersky is from Russia, so it's obvious he will protect the name. Even his connections with Government and Secret service in Russia are more then a public secret.

Russians Malware designers have big budgets backing their tasks with almost no control from the government.
Effective Malware and attacks are those which get publicity and attention. Non effective ones are just garbage in your mailbox and web archives...

JimmyCrackCorn! · 21-10-2009 06:21PM

bSlick wrote: »

You often hear about the dangers of hacking and how hackers could steal money from bank accounts. Is this actually a real danger or is it just media hype? Whatever about actually hacking into a system, how in the name of god is a hacker supposed to wire funds from one bank account to another, and even if they managed that it's not going to be hard to catch them given that all the bank has to do is look at the destination account of the money.

So are any hackers out there actually making money by stealing it or do they only make money by selling hacked information and/or blackmail?

Its not hackers its fraudsters, Hackers just gets banged around as a generic term and has as such lost its meaning.

Without going in to too much detail most of the thefts work by transferring
money to an unsuspecting mule.
You then pay the mule too much money and they in turn send you back x ammount in western union money transfers.

There are other cons and methods but i for one believe in Karma.

Jail love is just not worth the risk.:D:D

fryup · 29-10-2009 11:39PM

did anyone see watchdog tonite on bbc1, they had an item on hacking in wifi zones, cafes etc...hackers could could use your email address!!

so what about mobile BB, could that be easily infiltrated??

anyway isn't a firewall suppose to prevent this from happening??

Procasinator · 30-10-2009 11:53AM

fryup wrote: »

did anyone see watchdog tonite on bbc1, they had an item on hacking in wifi zones, cafes etc...hackers could could use your email address!!

so what about mobile BB, could that be easily infiltrated??

anyway isn't a firewall suppose to prevent this from happening??

Depends on how they were doing it, but if I was to guess, they were doing ARP poisoning and using some of the vulnerabilities of SSL to do man in the middle attacks.

FruitLover · 30-10-2009 01:26PM

fryup wrote: »

anyway isn't a firewall suppose to prevent this from happening??

A personal firewall can't protect you from anything that happens outside your computer (e.g. network traffic in transit).

The general public seem to think that firewalls are catch-all magic boxes

Capt'n Midnight · 01-11-2009 12:36AM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_farming There are up to a million gold farmers in China, just to give you an idea of the sort of manpower it is possible to hire to do stuff.

Botnets of a million pc's have been found, so there is no shortage of processing power for cracking stuff , or badwidth for denial of service or sending spam.

Rather than target one person, they target everyone and hope they get lucky.

The break even point for spam is something like one purchase for every 30,000,000 emails so even at the bottom end of the scale there is enough money to make it worth someone's while. And don't forget they don't need western wages either.

And to re-iterate a firewall won't protect you from something you click on or download from a webpage

syklops · 01-11-2009 04:59AM

Martyr wrote: »

Forgive for asking, but where did you read that?
Because it sounds a little like the media hype bSlick is referring to.

Are there studies that indicate majority of cyber crime originates from Russia?
Crime perpetrated by hackers employed by the russian mafia?

I find that hard to believe, just because they're russian with less opportunity to make money from their skills, doesn't mean they're involved in computer crime.

There are just as many scams being run by individuals from Nigeria for example, they use computers yet are not considered hackers.

sounds more like prejudice to me.

Well I am a security consultant, and have investigated dozens of so called "hacks" on both Government and private systems. The only 2 defacements I have seen(professionally) was one where the page was covered in Chinese writing, originating from an IP address in Russia, and the other covered in Cyrillic, coming from China.

There is abit of a cyberwar going on at the moment, and China and Russia are not the only players in it. Turkey are playing, as are the US, and various other countries.

Its basically saber rattling for when WW3 kicks off, and they can each show what they can really do.

The Media(as usual) is five minutes behind the times. The bigger picture is, computer fraud is no longer in the realm of petty thieves and scammers, but is now in the fist of nations, and they are using for their own purposes. The Russian and Chinese mafia(and governments) are recruiting for smart people to hack for them. Plenty of other mafia are as well, probably including the Irish one.

Hacking, real danger or media hype?

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