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Finnish Bank OP Under Persistent DDoS Attack
An anonymous reader writes The Finnish bank OP Pohjola Group has been a target of a dedicated DDoS attack for days. The attack, which investigators said was launched from both Finland and abroad, began on New Year's Eve. OP was forced to open a helpline for customers unable to confirm payments or transfer money because of jammed systems. On Saturday the firm said it would compensate people for any losses or late payment fees incurred as a result of attack. On Sunday morning the bank tweeted that its services were operating normally and even customers based outside Finland were able to access their accounts — and that it was still monitoring traffic carefully to try and ward off any renewed strikes. However, on Sunday afternoon further denial of service attacks took place delaying payments and preventing access to banking services for OP customers. A formal police complaint has been filed and OP says that KRP is looking into the case.
I see no other reason for this DDoS attack but vandalism of some sort. The attackers have no political agenda (this is a small Finnish bank, not one of the big tax-haven transfer banks like UBS. It also has no political connections/owners.
The attack also has no way of obtaining any useful info, as all banks in Finland use one-time passwords for login.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
That "tiny" finish bank has US$3.23 billion in revenues, around US$900 million in net income, and nearly 13 thousand employees. They can afford to pay a bit more for their servers.
Actually, it seems the attackers are mostly just a loose bunch of youngsters trying to emulate the big groups, ie. Lizard Squard and Anon et.al. I certainly have not heard anything hinting towards any ransom. F-Secure already has identified and knows from before of several of the attackers, so we can expect arrests soonish.