The cyber attack on Adobe is just another example in a wave of global attacks targeting personal and business financial data.

Adobe, the software company behind Acrobat, Photoshop and InDesign has experienced a data breach, potentially compromising the data of 2.9 million customers, including customer names, encrypted credit or debit card numbers, expiration dates, and other information relating to customer orders.

“Our investigation currently indicates that the attackers accessed Adobe customer IDs and encrypted passwords on our systems,” said Brad Arkin, Adobe chief security officer in a Customer Security Announcement on October 3^rd.

Adobe has reset passwords on customers’ accounts and recommended that customers change their passwords on any other website where they may have used the same user ID and password. The company has alerted the banks processing customer payments, as well as federal law enforcement.

Adobe also said it would give affected customers the option of enrolling in a one-year complimentary credit monitoring membership where available.

What’s the threat?

According to Brian Krebs, of the KrebsonSecurity blog, the threat is that the Adobe hackers could have hidden zero-day exploit code within a PDF document, or Flash animations, to create weaponised content.  They would then use a spear-phishing email to deliver the weaponised content to the targeted user. “When the user opens the attachment or watches the animation, the exploit code exploits the vulnerability to silently download malware on the user’s machine. The user isn’t aware that this download has happened. But this malware, often a Remote Access Trojan (RAT), enables the attacker to access sensitive data or even gain full control over the user’s machine” explains Krebs.

Lessons Learned

These breaches underscore the importance of organizations continuously monitoring their systems for suspicious changes and unknown programs on their systems, as well as providing their employees with security awareness training.

Once the breach happens, it is imperative that a business continuity plan be executed in a timely manner and that the proper communication be established with the public. 

Please feel free to contact ABEX and WatSec for more information on how you can effectively manage your cyber risks.

Efficient Services Escrow Group of Irvine, California, was subjected to a $1.5 million Cyber heist that caused it to go out of business and lay off all 9 of its employees. Escrow companies are responsible for safeguarding funds, and if escrowed funds are at risk, the state regulator has the right to step in and protect those escrowed funds.

What went wrong?

Between December 2012 and January 2013, Efficient Services was hit with three separate fraudulent wire service transfers. These were from the company’s bank, First Foundation of Irvine, CA, to bank accounts in Russia and China.  The first $432,215 that left Efficient Services’ account on Dec. 17 was recovered from Russia, but two other wires totaling over $1.1 million, which were sent to China on Jan. 24 and Jan. 30, were not recovered.

Efficient Services reported its losses to the California Department of Corporations on February 22, which launched an investigation. On Feb. 28, The Department of Corporations froze the escrow company’s activity and noted that the company had previously had instances of negligent bookkeeping and record-keeping practices.

According to former Washington Post reporter and now fraud blogger Brian Krebs, who first reported the Efficient Services incident on Aug. 13, the bank initially thought the losses resulted from embezzlement, not an account hack.

Why is this important?

Since then, a state investigation determined that a cyber theft was to blame for the losses. The cause of the incident was a remote access Trojan virus that was planted in Efficient Services’ systems. Nonetheless, the escrow company, unable to make up for its losses, has closed.

This incident now stands as one of the largest account takeover cases on record, eclipsed only by the June 2010 Global Title Services theft, which resulted in $2 million in fraudulent transfers and just over $200,000 in unrecovered losses. 

Lessons Learned

In a case like this it is hard to determine whether the responsibility lies with the company or the bank.  No litigation has been filed yet, but a civil suit may be filed in order to resolve the issue of responsibility for this case. Regardless, the fact remains that a cyber security breach has caused the company to close its doors and terminate jobs. 

This cyber attack killed a viable business that was on its way to clear half a million in profits in 2014 and a million the year after.