FS-ISAC, a cyber intelligence sharing community focused on financial services, announced that more than 100 financial services firms were targets of a wave of Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) extortion attacks last year.
The criminals sent extortion notes threatening to disrupt the firms’websites and digital services. The threat actor methodically moved across jurisdictions in Europe, North America, Latin America, and Asia Pacific, hitting dozens of institutions within weeks.
They targeted the full gamut of financial services companies: banks, fintechs, exchanges, card issuers, payments companies, insurance companies, credit bureaus, asset managers, money transfer companies, and payroll companies.
| DDoS Attacks by Sub-Vertical | |
| Retail Banking | 41% |
| Exchange | 15% |
| Payments | 13% |
| Securities & Investments | 10% |
| Insurance | 7% |
| Critical Utility | 3% |
| Credit Reporting Agency and Ratings | 2% |
| Core Back Office Supplier | 1% |
| DDoS Attacks by Region | |
| North America (Us, Canada) | 43% |
| Europe, UK, Middle East & Africa | 38% |
| Asia | 15% |
| Latin America | 3% |
FS-ISAC credits its members’ willingness to share cyber intelligence with mitigating the impact and threat for the financial services industry. Members were able to keep up with the rapid pace of attacks using the FS-ISAC Intelligence Exchange’s secure chat and intelligence sharing capabilities, which enables industry collaboration and discussion in real time.
FS-ISAC launched the Global Leaders award program. This is a company effort to elevate the profiles of members in the financial services community who actively share cyber intelligence and best practices across borders.
“An attack on a bank in Asia could be a harbinger for an attack on an insurance company in the US, a stock exchange in Latin America, or a fintech in Europe,” said Teresa Walsh, global head of Intelligence at FS-ISAC.
The attacks have slowed but the recent boom in cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, which cyber criminals use to demand payment, could incentivize other attacks.
“In 2021, we have already seen new cyber threats in the form of supply chain attacks, which we can expect to proliferate and evolve quickly. The only way to stay ahead of these ever more sophisticated threat actors is to collaborate,” said Jerry Perullo, CISO at ICE/NYSE and FS-ISAC chairman of the Board.
