14 DAY TRIAL // Over the past months, financial institutions from the United States have been hit several times by distributed denial-of-service (DDOS) attacks. To aid these organizations, last month, the FBI briefed bank execs on the agency’s investigation into the cyberattacks.
According to Reuters, security officers and other executives were given temporary security clearances to participate in a video conference that focused on who was launching the attacks.
The hackers, calling themselves the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Cyber Fighters, claim that their only goal is to get the Innocence of Muslims movie removed from the web. However, US officials believe the Cyber Fighters are just a cover-up for a state-sponsored attack, most likely from Iran.
Present at the Reuters Cybersecurity Summit, FBI Executive Assistant Director Richard McFeely hasn’t revealed what the bank execs were told about the hackers.
McFeely has only highlighted the fact that the briefing given to US bank execs is part of the agency’s efforts to share information with cybercrime victims.