[ISN] Hyundai Capital admits to unprecedented information leak

http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/472385.html

By Jung Hyuk-june
The Hankyoreh
April 11, 2011

A recently announced hacking incident at Hyundai Capital marked an 
unprecedented systematic accessing of customer financial information by 
hackers, resulting in major aftereffects. The breach in the computer 
network has not only sunk confidence levels to rock bottom for financial 
companies, for whom security is essential, but also spawned concerns 
about secondary effects due to leaked passwords and other information.

Hyundai Capital announced Friday that the personal information accessed 
through the hack consisted of name, email, and cell phone information 
for 420 thousand people, approximately 23 percent of all customers, and 
that it bore no direct connection with financial transactions. However, 
Vice President Hwang Yoo-no said Sunday that there was “a possibility 
that some secret information was hacked, including customer passwords 
and credit ratings,” indicating that it appeared likely that passwords 
were leaked for around 13 thousand customers.

In the past, there have been leaks of financial information amounting to 
a few hundred people through efforts by criminal organizations, but no 
cases such as this one of information being hacked for more than 10 
thousand people at one time. In short, the company’s security system did 
not function at all. Observers are predicting no major damages in the 
immediate future, as the passwords accessed were for “minus loan” cards. 
But the possibility does exist for secondary effects since many 
individuals use the same password at various locations when conducting 
transactions with financial companies.

The revelation of systematic criminal efforts by hackers has the 
potential to develop into a problem for the financial world as a whole 
rather than Hyundai Capital alone, as it is impossible to guarantee that 
the security systems of other financial companies such as banks and 
credit card companies are safe either. For this reason, many observers 
are saying that a full reexamination of the security systems for South 
Korean financial companies has become unavoidable.

[...]


___________________________________________________________      
Tegatai Managed Colocation: Four Provider Blended
Tier-1 Bandwidth, Fortinet Universal Threat Management,
Natural Disaster Avoidance, Always-On Power Delivery 
Network, Cisco Switches, SAS 70 Type II Datacenter. 
Find peace of mind, Defend your Critical Infrastructure.
http://www.tegataiphoenix.com/