Swedish bank hit by £600K internet fraud

Swedish bank Nordea has suffered the biggest internet fraud in history after more than eight million kronor (around £576,000) disappeared as a result of tailor-made Trojans launched by Russian criminals. 

Up to 250 customers at Sweden's largest bank are thought to have been hit by the attacks, which have taken place over three months.

The attack worked by targeting Nordea's customers, who were asked to download an anti-spam program. Anyone who downloaded the 'raking.zip' or 'raking.exe' files was infected by the 'haxdoor.ki' Trojan.

The Trojan activated itself when users tried to log in to their online account at the bank.

The software stole users' information before displaying an error message asking the client to resend the data. Criminals then had the two access codes needed to transfer money from the account.

Despite having a list of 121 suspects, the bank and the Swedish police have been unable to stop the attacks.

Police have discovered that the user information was sent to servers in America, before being forwarded to Russia.

"This is a worrying concern for any online bank user, as the threat of cyber-crime targeting 'safe' institutions becomes an ever more real concern," said security firm McAfee in a statement. 

McAfee recorded more than 17,000 phishing reports per month in 2006, and its research showed that 90 per cent of people are still unable to recognise a well constructed phishing message.

See also:

Experts warn of dramatic rise in phishing and ID theft

250 per cent rise in key-loggers and 100-fold increase in phishing  15 Jan 2007

IT security experts warn of phishing kit peril

Universal Man-in-the-Middle phishing kit discovered by RSA  11 Jan 2007

Opera sings praises of phishing protection

Latest version of browser gets real-time fraud and phishing protection  19 Dec 2006

Phishing worm rips through MySpace

Worm spooks site and tries to cash in on malware  05 Dec 2006

Study blasts failing phishing toolbars

Carnegie Mellon report shows inability to identify sites across the board  22 Nov 2006

Phishing scams push up web banking fraud losses

Trade association warns that web users still not taking security seriously  07 Nov 2006

Two-thirds of phishing scams target single US bank

Fifth Third Bank heads August phishing list by a mile  13 Sep 2006

Bank of Ireland agrees to phishing refunds

Customers will get their money back after fake website scam  07 Sep 2006

Like this story? Spread the news by clicking below:

 del.icio.us     Digg this     reddit!