Hackers stole more than 2 billion rubles (US$31.1 million) from correspondent accounts at the Bank of Russia, the central bank said on Friday, the latest example of an escalation of cyberattacks on financial institutions around the globe.
Bank of Russia official Artyom Sychyov discussed the losses at a briefing, saying that the hackers had attempted to steal about 5 billion rubles.
Sychyov was commenting on a central bank report released earlier in the day, that told about hackers breaking into accounts by faking a client’s credentials. The bank provided few other details in its lengthy report.
Financial regulators around the world have recently urged banks to beef up cybersecurity in the wake of a string of high-profile heists on banks around the world.
Fears about attacks on banks have mounted since February, when unidentified cybercriminals stole US$81 million in funds that Bangladesh’s central bank had on deposit at the US Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
Law enforcement agencies around the globe are hunting for the criminals who stole the money using fraudulent wire transfer requests sent over the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication network.
Separately, Russia on Friday said that it had uncovered a plot by foreign spy agencies to sow chaos in the country’s banking system via a coordinated wave of cyberattacks and fake social media reports about banks going bust.
Russia has been on high alert for foreign-inspired cyberattacks since US officials accused the Kremlin of being involved in hacks on US Democratic Party e-mail accounts during the US presidential election.
At the time, US Vice President Joe Biden said that the US would mount a “proportional” response to Russia.
Since then, there have been a number of cyberattacks affecting Russian institutions, although it is unclear if they were linked to the row between Moscow and Washington.
The US dollar was trading at NT$29.7 at 10am today on the Taipei Foreign Exchange, as the New Taiwan dollar gained NT$1.364 from the previous close last week. The NT dollar continued to rise today, after surging 3.07 percent on Friday. After opening at NT$30.91, the NT dollar gained more than NT$1 in just 15 minutes, briefly passing the NT$30 mark. Before the US Department of the Treasury's semi-annual currency report came out, expectations that the NT dollar would keep rising were already building. The NT dollar on Friday closed at NT$31.064, up by NT$0.953 — a 3.07 percent single-day gain. Today,
‘SHORT TERM’: The local currency would likely remain strong in the near term, driven by anticipated US trade pressure, capital inflows and expectations of a US Fed rate cut The US dollar is expected to fall below NT$30 in the near term, as traders anticipate increased pressure from Washington for Taiwan to allow the New Taiwan dollar to appreciate, Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行) chief economist Lin Chi-chao (林啟超) said. Following a sharp drop in the greenback against the NT dollar on Friday, Lin told the Central News Agency that the local currency is likely to remain strong in the short term, driven in part by market psychology surrounding anticipated US policy pressure. On Friday, the US dollar fell NT$0.953, or 3.07 percent, closing at NT$31.064 — its lowest level since Jan.
The New Taiwan dollar and Taiwanese stocks surged on signs that trade tensions between the world’s top two economies might start easing and as US tech earnings boosted the outlook of the nation’s semiconductor exports. The NT dollar strengthened as much as 3.8 percent versus the US dollar to 30.815, the biggest intraday gain since January 2011, closing at NT$31.064. The benchmark TAIEX jumped 2.73 percent to outperform the region’s equity gauges. Outlook for global trade improved after China said it is assessing possible trade talks with the US, providing a boost for the nation’s currency and shares. As the NT dollar
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) yesterday met with some of the nation’s largest insurance companies as a skyrocketing New Taiwan dollar piles pressure on their hundreds of billions of dollars in US bond investments. The commission has asked some life insurance firms, among the biggest Asian holders of US debt, to discuss how the rapidly strengthening NT dollar has impacted their operations, people familiar with the matter said. The meeting took place as the NT dollar jumped as much as 5 percent yesterday, its biggest intraday gain in more than three decades. The local currency surged as exporters rushed to
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