Another Cyber Attack Targeting Large Banking Institution

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New Zealand’s central bank was hacked. The Reserve Bank said that one of its data systems has been breached by an unidentified hacker who potentially accessed commercially and personally sensitive information. A third-party file sharing service used by the bank to share and store sensitive information had been illegally accessed, the bank said in a statement.

Cybersecurity risks to the financial system have grown in recent years, in part because the cyber threat landscape is worsening; in particular, state-sponsored cyberattacks targeting financial institutions are becoming more frequent, sophisticated, and destructive. 

In 2017, the G20 warned that cyberattacks could “undermine the security and confidence and endanger financial stability.”

To mention just a few examples of cyber attacks targeting financial institutions, last October, a software defect led to a disruption to the European Central Bank’s main payment system for almost 11 hours. In September, several Hungarian banking and telecommunication services were disrupted by a powerful DDoS attack launched from computer servers in Russia, China, and Vietnam, and in June, a large unidentified European bank was the target of a massive DDoS attack, according to carnegieendowment.org. 

Interested in learning more about the cybersecurity of financial institutions – watch INNOTECH 2020 Cyber Innovation and Homeland Security – Panel Discussion on asymmetry in cyber attacks – next generation IR: