Eight men have been arrested over a computer hacking attack at a Barclays bank in London.
It is alleged that one of the gang posed as an IT engineer, gaining access to the Swiss Cottage branch of Barclays by coming to fix the computer. They then fitted a device that allowed the hackers to access its network remotely and transfer money into their own accounts.
The device they used was a keyboard video mouse (KVM) which is available for as little as £10 and can be purchased in a wide range of computer stores and online. They then managed to steal £1.3 million from customer accounts.
The news is equally shocking as it was only a week ago that 12 men were arrested over an alleged plot to use the same device on a branch of Santander.
This leaves banks vulnerable to not only online cyber attacks, but also physical devices being used to access customer accounts.
This new cyber attack technology could be a threat to not just banks, but any business involved in trading. Martin Jordan, director in Information Security at KPMG commented on the risks of this happening to other organisations:
"This should be a wake-up call to anyone working in back office, trading and treasury desks, who will be trading millions of pounds. The equipment used in the retail banking attacks is readily available online costing no more than a few hundred pounds. Companies therefore need to increase their vigilance as this is not something that is going to go away. As an initial response companies should be performing bug sweeps of front and back office locations, both at a physical as well as electronic and radio frequency level."
