As per a US officer who was involved with investigations into the $80 million + heist, the attack on Bangladesh central bank’s account at the New York Federal Reserve was state-sponsored. While the name of the attackers was not disclosed, it appears as if authorities are getting close to nabbing him.
Meanwhile, officials have been naming possible culprits earlier on. For instance, officials in Washington who were speaking on condition of anonymity, had laid the blame squarely at North Korea’s feet. The FBI appeared to be heading in the same direction and this particular official all but confirms the previous rumors.
As a refresher, the FBI is part of an international group of investigative agencies that are looking into the case. The event is from last year, when hackers managed to breach Bangladesh Bank’s systems. They further deployed the SWIFT messaging network and ordered the transfer of nearly $1 billion from its account at the New York Fed. While most of the requests were rejected, the hackers still managed to get away with over $81 million.
Quite a bit of the money was later recovered, when a Casino owner in Manila told the senate inquiry that he had taken millions of dollars from tow Chinese hackers who had allegedly received the money as a result of the hack.
As per Reuters, the FBI will continue investigating the case until it apprehends the culprits.
So for us in the FBI, it is never over. We are going to bring these individuals to justice so that we can show others, that you maybe be able to muster such attacks, even state-sponsored, but you will not get away with it in the end
Well, rouge hackers are bad enough before these governments start putting god knows what infrastructure and computing resources at their disposal and using them to cause chaos.
