A significant uptick in cybercrime has been reported in the financial services industry. Traditional financial service providers and fintech companies must be on full alert. 

About 130 million fraud attacks were detected within a 90 day period stretching between January and March, 2017. Cyberattacks outpaced transaction growth by as much as 50 percent during this time.

"We saw a number of high-profile global breaches over the last year,” explained Vice President of Product Marketing at ThreatMatrix Vanita Pandey. “Identities are being bought, sold, traded and augmented by criminals seeking to improve the success of their increasingly complex attacks.”

Why is this happening? Traditional financial service organization and fintech firms are becoming increasingly intertwined, as fintech providers are transitioning from competitors to partners. Hackers, however, view fintech providers as being more vulnerable to attacks and are looking to capitalize on network vulnerabilities. 

As Pandey pointed out, identities are now the main currency in cybercrime. And for this reason, businesses must look beyond static data to ensure their users are in fact who they claim to be.

The report also explains that attack vectors and threat patterns are becoming more malicious, and sophisticated. For instance, a growing number of hackers are now relying on remote access Trojans (RATS) to infiltrate accounts, which combine remote access software with targeted social engineering tactics. RAT attacks are commonly used in ransomware deployments.

What's more, bots are being increasingly used to test identity credentials at scale and break into user accounts.

To learn more about how Apex Technology Services can protect your financial institution from cybercrime, click here.

A new breed of hacktrepeneurs has awoken and they have little to fear and everything to gain by infecting as many companies as possible and extorting money from them. Apex Technology Services stands ready to protect your company regardless of whether it’s located in New York City; White Plains, New York; Connecticut; Australia; Europe; or anywhere else. Our full suite of cybersecurity and IT support services is at your disposal, enabling you to spend less time worrying about and more time growing your business.

To ensure your security, consider one of our most popular services — Auditing & Documentation — which pinpoints vulnerabilities in your infrastructure, process flow and internal security procedures.