Financial institutions are often targeted by fraudsters because they handle large amounts of money and sensitive information. Here are a few specific cases that show the detailed process of financial institutions being defrauded: ### 1. Bangladesh Bank Robbery (2016) **Background:** The Bangladesh Bank suffered a serious cyberattack in 2016, resulting in the illegal transfer of approximately $81 million. **How the Fraud Worked:** 1. **Initial Infiltration:** The hackers successfully penetrated the computer system of Bangladesh Bank by implanting malware through phishing emails. 2. **Obtaining SWIFT Credentials:** The hackers moved laterally within the system and obtained credentials for the SWIFT network used to send international transfer instructions. 3. **Forged Instructions:** Using these fake credentials, the hackers issued multiple fund transfer instructions to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, targeting accounts in several banks in the Philippines and Sri Lanka. 4. **Money Laundering Process:** The transferred funds were further dispersed and laundered, and withdrawn through channels such as casinos, ultimately resulting in most of the funds being unrecoverable. **Impact and Lessons:** This incident exposed the security vulnerabilities of the SWIFT network, prompting global financial institutions to strengthen monitoring and security protection of the SWIFT system. ### 2. Carbanak Cybercrime Group Attack (2013-2018) **Background:** Carbanak (also known as FIN7) is a highly professional cybercrime group that focuses on attacking global financial institutions and retail businesses, stealing more than $1 billion. **Fraud Process:** 1. **Phishing Attack:** Hackers send phishing emails with malware to employees of financial institutions. Once employees click or download attachments, the malware is implanted into the system. 2. **Internal Network Penetration:** Malware helps hackers gain system permissions, map internal network structures, and identify key financial systems and transfer processes. 3. **Control Operations:** Hackers control the bank's internal systems, modify transaction records, and authorize large transfers to accounts they control. 4. **Cash Withdrawal:** Through the ATM network, hackers remotely control ATM machines, withdraw cash on a large scale, or quickly transfer funds through other means to reduce the risk of being discovered. **Impact and lessons:** The group's activities revealed the weak links in the internal cybersecurity of financial institutions, prompting banks to strengthen employee training, network monitoring and abnormal behavior detection. ### 3. SWIFT network abuse attacks (multiple cases) **Background:** The SWIFT (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication) system is the main network for global interbank fund transfers, but its openness also makes it a target of attack. **Typical cases:** - **2014 hacker attack:** Several Eastern European banks were hacked through the SWIFT system and millions of dollars were illegally transferred. - **2017 Ukrainian state-owned bank hijacked:** Hackers used the SWIFT system to issue false instructions to transfer millions of dollars to fake accounts. **Fraud process:** 1. **System penetration:** Hackers gain access to the bank's SWIFT system through social engineering, malware or vulnerability attacks. 2. **Forged instructions:** Using legitimate SWIFT credentials, fraudulent fund transfer instructions are sent, which appear to be normal and normal. 3. **Fund transfer:** Funds are quickly transferred to pre-set accounts, usually in countries or regions with loose legal supervision. 4. **Fund Laundering:** Through layers of transactions and decentralized transfers, the source of funds is concealed, and money laundering is ultimately achieved. **Impact and Lessons:** These incidents have prompted SWIFT to strengthen the security measures of its system, including multi-factor authentication, transaction monitoring and abnormal behavior detection, and financial institutions have also improved their internal security review standards. ### 4. CEO Fraud **Background:** CEO Fraud is a social engineering attack in which fraudsters impersonate senior executives of a company (such as CEO, CFO) to issue urgent transfer instructions to the finance department. **Typical Case:** - **A medium-sized company in Europe (2016):** The fraudster forged an email address, impersonated the company's CEO, and instructed the CFO to transfer an emergency fund to an overseas account for acquisitions. The CFO executed the transfer without multiple verifications and lost about $500,000. **Fraud Process:** 1. **Information Collection:** Fraudsters collect information and communication styles of senior executives of the target company through social media, company websites, etc. 2. **Fake communication:** By email or phone, impersonating the CEO or other senior executives, send urgent transfer instructions to the financial department, usually requiring completion within a short period of time to reduce verification time. 3. **Execution of transfer:** The financial staff executes the transfer according to the instructions, and the funds flow to the account controlled by the fraudster. 4. **Delayed discovery:** Because the transfer passes through multiple intermediary accounts, the funds are transferred quickly, making it difficult to recover in the end. **Impact and lessons:** This type of fraud emphasizes the importance of internal communication and verification procedures. Many companies have therefore strengthened multi-level approval, double verification and employee training to prevent similar incidents. ### 5. International Monetary Fund (IMF) fraud case**Background:** Some fraud gangs contacted national representatives in the name of IMF officials, claiming that due to excess funds, they need to pay a handling fee to release the funds. **Fraud process:** 1. **Impersonation:** The fraudster pretends to be a senior IMF official and contacts the financial department of the target country by email or phone. 2. **Making a story:** Create an urgent reason, saying that due to some program errors, a certain amount of money needs to be paid as a handling fee or deposit to release the frozen funds. 3. **Fund transfer:** After confirming the "instructions", the victim transfers the funds to the account provided by the scammer. 4. **Fund disappearance:** The scammer takes advantage of the complexity of international transfers and the difficulty of cross-border tracking to quickly transfer and hide the funds, making it difficult to recover the losses. **Impact and lessons:** This case reminds financial institutions that when handling international fund transactions, they must strictly verify the identity of the other party and avoid transferring funds without confirming the authenticity. --- ### Summary These cases show the vulnerability of financial institutions in the face of cyber attacks, social engineering and internal management loopholes. To prevent such fraud, financial institutions should take the following measures: - **Strengthen network security protection:** Including firewalls, intrusion detection systems and regular security audits. - **Employee training:** Improve employees' ability to identify phishing attacks and social engineering. - **Multi-level verification:** Implement multi-level approval and double verification mechanisms for large transfers and sensitive operations. - **Real-time monitoring:** Monitor abnormal transaction behaviors through advanced data analysis and machine learning technology. - **Emergency response plan:** Develop a detailed emergency response plan to respond quickly and reduce losses when security incidents occur. By combining technical means and management measures, financial institutions can significantly reduce the risk of fraud and protect the safety of their customers and their own funds.