What Bank Cyberattacks Can Teach All Businesses About Better Financial Records Security

The U.S. financial industry has been under attack. In September, some of the largest banking institutions in the country were hit with distributed-denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, and it appears that a new wave of attacks has begun. These attacks are in direct response to the controversial anti-Muslim movie that has sparked outrage in the Middle East.

According to CIO magazine, the campaign has been dubbed ‘Project Blitzkrieg' by its inventor and is supposed to use a whole bunch of hacker cells who will all attack at the same time. All of the hacker cells will all be using a version of the Gozi Trojan called ‘Gozi Prinimalka.' But for many, the concern isn't what the Trojan is called but rather what it does, and that steals money - over $5 million since 2008.

Now, the vast majority of businesses are not considered to be part of the financial industry, but virtually all industries now use software, including ERP solutions like Microsoft Dynamics AX, GP, NAV, and SL, to manage their finances. If nothing else, the attacks on banks should make all industries question the security of financial data. Are your databases vulnerable to an attack?

The banking industry is all about finances, and in turn, protecting those financial assets from hackers and cybercriminals should be the top priority in cybersecurity. And yet, the industry seems at a loss to protect itself from the DDoS attacks and Trojans it knows is coming.

Verizon's 2012 Data Breach Investigations Report said that compromised records last year skyrocketed to 174 million with organized cybercrime groups ...