Wednesday (19 SEP) proved to be a day of hand-wringing and concern for the financial sector as the online presences of both Chase and Bank of America suffered outages and performance impact, allegedly due to distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks.

Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FS-ISAC) has raised its Cyber Threat Level from 'Elevated' to 'High' on the basis of "credible intelligence regarding the potential for DDoS and other cyber-attacks against financial institutions".

According to Reuters, FS-ISAC’s advisory comes right on the heels of a "fraud alert" that the FBI published advising financial services firms that cyber criminals may be disrupting service to their websites in a bid to keep banks from noticing a recent surge in fraudulent large-sized wire transfers.

These attacks also follow a statement posted to the Internet in which the claimant stated attacks would continue until “the film that had stirred up anti-U.S. protests across the Middle East was "erased" from the Internet.”

 

Source article: http://news.yahoo.com/jpmorgan-chase-consumer-website-intermittently-down-182802693--sector.html

 

If ISC learns of any consistencies in data that can be correlated, we’ll be sure to keep you informed and stand ready to assist.

Meanwhile, per FS-ISAC, particularly for those of you defending resources in the financial sector, “maintain a heightened level of awareness, apply all appropriate updates and update AV and IDS/IPS signatures, ensure constant diligence in monitoring and quick response to any malicious events.”

Russ McRee | @holisticinfosec