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Feds charge nine hackers for $30M insider trading scheme
The Wall Street Journal reports that federal prosecutors are set to unseal charges Tuesday against nine hackers and stock traders involved in an insider trading operation that netted more than $30 million on illicit deals. The group to be charged allegedly had been conducting sophisticated cyber-attacks against newswire services in order to steal upcoming merger and acquisition information that had been uploaded to the newswire's servers -- but not yet published -- and position their investments accordingly. The group was discovered after a multi-agency investigation involving the DHS, FBI, SEC and the Secret Service.
Hackers are using finance smarts and English skills to attack biotech firms
Sometimes social engineering can be far more effective than complicated malware when it comes to cyber attacks. Case in point: the cybersecurity firm FireEye has tracked a recent spate of attacks against over 100 healthcare and pharmaceutical companies to a particularly smooth group of hackers. The group -- which FireEye calls "Fin4" -- leverages its knowledge of those industries, financial markets, and native English skills for targeted attacks against executives and other notable employees. Instead of relying on spyware, the group carefully crafts emails that trick recipients into logging into malicious websites to steal their email logins. These aren't your typical hackers --- FireEye believes Fin4 is made up of Americans or Western Europeans who've worked in the U.S. banking industry. The sophisticated and methodical nature of the attacks also distinguishes them from the hackers who just want to blindly steal data.
