Hackers are worming their way into databases and demanding money to give back access. When a managing director of a popular ice cream manufacturing company in the city opened his computer recently to access his company's database, he saw a message that startled him. “Pay $1,000 to get your data back and do the payment in Bitcoins."
The perplexed MD tried to refresh and restart the machine, but the message kept repeating. Most of the company data had been encrypted cutting off his access to it.
In short, the database had been hacked and the hackers were demanding money to decrypt the data.
The new trend of `cyber extortion' has the cyber crime wing of the Hyderabad police on tenterhooks. “An incident of data being kept hos age was first reported a year ago. At that time, we did not ake it seriously. But when another victim came with a similar complaint in late July, we realised that it's a new modus operandi,“ assist ant commissioner of police Cyber Crimes) B Anuradha old INNLIVE. “The victims could not access their data as it was controlled by the hackers,“ she explained.
It was found that hackers were penetrating the weak security systems of several companies and demanding payment in Bitcoins, which he police are now terming as he hawala system of cyber space.
Also in the recesses of he world wide web are several rogue websites that are putting up for sale the confidential information belonging to individuals. The information sold can range from email IDs to Aadhaar and bank account numbers.
“The personal information of people is getting leaked by unscrupulous employees of banks, who are approached unofficially by those looking for prospective customers. Data sharing is invaluable for improving businesses. But in several cases, the information is put up for sale for a few lakhs of rupees and is bought by organised gangs indulging in various kinds of frauds,“ a cyber police officer said. By feeding the data into the easily-available `brute force' software tools, fraudsters generate various possible passwords against an email id or bank accounts in under a minute. Once the accounts are hacked, financial fraud like illegal money transfer is readily done.
One of the most common frauds being committed by hackers is to misguide business partners by sending emails from similar looking email ids and asking them to transfer money to new accounts.
“Corporates and individuals should always maintain upgraded operating systems, firewalls and advanced antivirus softwares to protect data from intrusion. One should avoid using unlicensed, pirated, free anti-virus tools available on the web, since many of them are not foolproof. Corporates should have a periodic cyber audit to avoid data hacking. Never open unsolicited mails or invites on social media,“ joint commissioner of police (CCS), T Prabhakar Rao, told INNLIVE.
Only around five per cent of several crores of rupees siphoned off by on line fraudsters every year in the twin cities are recovered experts said, while underlin ing the importance of making complaints fast.
Central Crime Station (CCS) officials said that in most cases, money can be recovered only when the vic tims report the incident in less than 24 hours. Any fur ther delay will make matters difficult as the money crosses Indian shores very quickly .
“Victims of online fraud should complain to the police as early as possible, which means the moment money gets deducted from the bank account. In any online bank ing transaction, the gateway clearance takes at least 24 hours. So, if victims approach he police without wasting ime, we can freeze the mon ey and there are 90 per cent chances of recovery,“ joint commissioner of police (CCS) T Prabhakar Rao told INNLIVE.
According to the police ack of foolproof system n issuing ID cards such as Aadhaar, voter ID etc is compounding the problem Criminals obtain these IDs il egally and use it to open bank accounts. Most banks do not bother with background veri fication or check whether the account holder resides in that address or not.
Thus, when in vestigators pull out accounts where money gets illegally ransferred, they often reach a dead end. International gangs sometimes are also in connivance with locals who help them use accounts for the nitial transfer. From these ac counts, the money reaches in ernational accounts.
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