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Wednesday, June 20, 2012

Hacker Breaches 79 Banks, Releases Data of 1,700 Accounts - tomsguide.com - 19 Jun 2012

A hacker going by the name Reckz0r has released credit card data from more than 1,700 accounts in an attack that targeted Visa and Mastercard credit cards.


The hack which was posted via Twitter and Pastebin links to a downloadable file on Anonfiles. The 50 GB, 113-page data dump includes names, addresses, e-mail addresses, and phone numbers in unencrypted text. However, there are no credit card numbers tied to these addressed. Reckz0r said that he did not attack Visa and MasterCard directly, but hit more than 79 large banks over a time frame of three months.

Of course, the fact that no credit card numbers were exposed and the attack was not targeted at customers is of little comfort to those who are affected. Also, there was no confirmation that the affected banks actually informed the affected customers of the breach, which continues the concern that data breaches are not communicated to end users in a timely manner.

According to Cnet, Reckz0r, who claims to have been a member of Anonymous, announced last week that he would be "retiring" and turn into a whitehat hacker instead. In that announcement, he apologized to those who may have been negatively affected by his hacks: "I've done over 50 large hacks, and leaked many essential information, I am sorry if I harmed you, or affected your families," the hacker writes. "This is my departure from the hacking scene. I am no-longer a hacker, I'm a whitehat."

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