We can’t escape the constant threat of cybercrime, and some new information suggests that holiday e-banking could be the next big target for some nefarious individuals.
The news is coming in from those security boffins at Kaspersky Lab that banking institutions are likely going to be the next target for cybercriminals over the holiday season, with a new trojan application called “Neverquest” doing some serious damage to bypass just about any online banking security system.
The virus can replicate itself easily, and that suggests it will be used to break into multiple banking services, doing its best to steal usernames and passwords, delivering the information to whomever sets up the security attack.
“After wrapping up several criminal cases associated with the creation and proliferation of malware used to steal bank website data, a few ‘holes’ appeared on the black market,” said Sergey Golovanov, Kaspersky Lab’s Principal Security Researcher.
“New malicious users are trying to fill these with new technologies and ideas. Neverquest is just one of the threats aiming to take over the leading positions previously held by programs like ZeuS and Carberp.”
It’s bad news for banks and their customers, with the virus also able to install scripts for web browsers and let the information be transmitted to a server handled by the controller of the Neverquest trojan.
According to Kaspersky, once the information is grabbed, a cybercriminal can login and wire your money out of your account and into theirs, creating a horrible situation for anyone.
Kaspersky tells us that more than basic anti-virus is needed to ward this thing, which means looking into a dedicated internet security solution, one that has the ability to prevent manipulation of a running browser by extra processes, of which everyone should be using in some way.
We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: anti-virus isn’t all you need anymore, and with the threat of malware, phishing, and plenty of other security exploits that can be run in web browsers, a full internet security solution should be run on any and every computer, so if you don’t have one running, go and get one right now.
The last thing you want is to have the gift of an empty bank account just because you decided to surf the web without protection. That’s a holiday season nobody wants to see.
