Cyberheist Victim Trades Smokes for Cash
Summary: An export/import firm in the northeastern United States lost $197,000 on Christmas Eve 2013 after cybercrooks infected its accountant's machine with a password-stealing Trojan, hijacked her browser session, and used a supplied one-time token to wire the money to a company in Harbin, China. The company later recovered about $166,000 after a lawyer contact in China met Harbin police with a carton of cigarettes and a promised cut of the funds, and the police froze the recipient's account.
Why it matters: Krebs notes he has written over 100 pieces on companies losing six figures or more to cyberheists and that very few ever get their money back - and under the UCC, a business's payment order can be treated as authorized if the bank's security procedure is deemed commercially reasonable, unlike consumers protected by Regulation E.
Read the original at Krebs on Security ↗
- Topics
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