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Kaspersky report shows growing threat from hacking attacks on FIs

Growing interest in 'big money' is reflected in a sharp rise in the number of banking Trojans over the last year. Most of these ultimately involve an ATM cash-out.

August 4, 2014

In its Q2 threat report, issued today, Kaspersky Lab todaysaid its products detected and neutralized a staggering 995,534,410 threats during the quarter. In particular, the Woburn, Massachusetts-based company saw an increase in online banking threats and mobile malware. The main targeted attacks during the quarter included:

Web-based attacks

• 354.5 million attacks were launched from online resources located all over the world — 1.3 million more than in Q1; and
• Among the top five sources of web attacks, Germany rose from fourth to first; the US dropped from first to second, followed by the Netherlands in third place, the Russian Federation in fourth, and Canada in fifth.

Mobile threats

• At the end of Q1 2014, Kaspersky's collection of mobile malware stood at almost 300,000 samples. In the second quarter the collection increased by more than 65,000 new malicious mobile programs.

Q2 exposed the activities of the Hacking Team, an Italian company that sells "legal" software called Remote Control System. The iOS module allows an attacker to access data on the device, to activate the microphone and to take photos.

Ransomware technology proved to be actively developing throughout the quarter. In early June, Kaspersky Lab detected a new modification of Svpeng aimed primarily at users in the US. The Trojan locks the phone and demands $200 to unlock it.

According to Alexander Gostev, chief security expert on the global research and analysis team at Kaspersky Lab:

The first six months of the year have shown that, as predicted, encryption of user data on smartphones has evolved. Criminals are making money by using methods that have proven effective for PC users. The growing interest in 'big' money among those carrying out these attacks is obvious — reflected in a sharp rise (14.5 times) in the number of banking Trojans over the last year. In addition to the financial benefits, the surveillance technology race is showing no letup. HackingTeam mobile modules showed that a mobile device can be used to gain complete control over the whole environment in and around a victim's device.

Online banking threats

• the banking fraud campaign Luuuk stole half a million euros from 190 victims in just one week via ATM cash-out;
• banking malware attacked 927,568 computers in Q2. The figure for May saw a 36.6 percent increase compared to that for April; most attacks were recorded in Brazil, Russia, Italy, Germany and the U.S.;
• 2,033 mobile banking Trojans were detected in the last three months. Since the beginning of 2014 their number has increased fourfold.

Malicious objects

•60 million unique malicious objects (scripts, web pages, exploits, executable files, etc.) were detected, double the figure for Q1 2014; and

•145.3 million unique URLs were recognized as malicious by web antivirus — 63.5 million more than in the previous quarter.

The full report is available at securelist.com

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