A Texas based bank is suing a customer over 1.66M stolen in a 2012 cyberheist. The bank had\u00a0initially believed that the cash had been routed out of the country but now believes it is within the\u00a0country. The cash is believed to be held in an account in a U.S bank that has already been frozen by\u00a0the FBI pending completion of the cyber heist crime.<\/p>\n
In June 2012, unknown cybercriminals hacked into the computer systems of Luna & Luna. The firm\u00a0is a real estate escrow entity based in Garland, Texas. The hackers stole the password and username\u00a0which the firm was using to access and manage its bank account held at Texas Brand Bank (TBB)\u00a0which is also located in Garland.<\/p>\n
The hackers stole around $1.75 million via a number of wire transfers while using the stolen Luna\u00a0username and password. These transfers were carried out between June 21st and July 2nd, 2012. Initial\u00a0investigations showed that Jixi City Tianfeng Trade Limited Company which held an account at\u00a0Industrial and Commercial Bank of China was the recipient of two of the wire transfers. A third\u00a0transfer that went to a U.S based company and which was later recovered totaled $89,651.<\/p>\n
Heilongjiang Provence is said to lurk with financial institutions that readily accept wire transfers of\u00a0any large amounts from any corner of the world without any form of verification. Jixi, one of the recipient companies of the Luna\u2019s stolen funds is located in this Northern Province bordering\u00a0Russia. Incidentally, a year before the Luna attack, the FBI had issued a warning that the now\u00a0infamous cyberheist destination Chinese province was the recipient of more than $20M the previous\u00a0year. Most of the cyberheist funds are from small and medium-sized companies and routed towards\u00a0Chinese economic and trade companies in this northern frontier Province of Chinese.<\/p>\n
It was not until the bank informed Luna & Luna on July 2, 2012 that they were about to overdraw\u00a0their account that they realized they had been victims of a cyberheist. The money that the criminals\u00a0took from Luna\u2019s account was being held in Escrow\/trust for the U.S Department of Housing and\u00a0Urban Development (HUD). However, much as the criminals had put Luna in a hard corner, they\u00a0had practically robbed the U.S government. Luna had to approach the bank and make it understand\u00a0that the money stolen belonged to the government and had to be replaced fast.<\/p>\n
In their initial complaint, Luna reasoned that the theft affected TBB and HUD but more so TBB.\u00a0TBB in its original complaint wrote that based on the fact that it stood to lose more than the\u00a0siphoned monies, it had agreed to reimburse Luna. It agreed to reimburse the cash on condition that\u00a0it could legally place a claim to recover the monies from Luna. Afterwards, TBB as it had promised\u00a0demanded repayment from Luna but Luna refused to pay. On July 1, 2013, Luna sued to recover\u00a0funds which now included legal fees and interest.<\/p>\n
Much of the year that followed, Luna and TBB spent it haggling on where the trial should be held.\u00a0Luna went ahead and filed a counterclaim lawsuit which alleged that TBB\u2019s security system was\u00a0highly inefficient. It claimed that the bank was in a position at the time of the theft to tell that\u00a0payment to China, especially of large amounts was highly suspicious.<\/p>\n
It is a\u00a0defense against the Luna allegations, TBB clarified that stated that Luna agreed in writing that\u00a0the bank should go ahead and execute hundreds of wire transfers to third parties from the client\u2019s\u00a0accounts. Moreover, the bank claims that it had expressly offered Luna the safer dual-controls\u00a0security. This security measure requires that a customer has a different set of password and\u00a0username for sending a wire transfer and for approving.<\/p>\n
When in a conversation with an FBI agent, Luna learnt that $1.66M of stolen money was actually in\u00a0an account at JPMorgan Chase. JPMorgan Chase was the receiving bank for these cyberheist funds.<\/p>\n
In August, Luna went to a US District Court for Northern District Texas and reported what they had\u00a0learnt from the FBI agent. Together with the TBB, Luna is requesting the government to release the\u00a0said funds which will be used to settle the dispute once and for all.<\/p>\n
The FBI didn\u2019t want to comment on the matter. Northern District has investigations underway\u00a0relating to criminal claims as well as fraudulent wire transfers. However, the court\u2019s attorney\u00a0refrained from commenting only saying that as of now no criminal charges have been drawn. It will\u00a0be interesting to see how this puns out especially because both the firm and the bank can\u2019t claim to\u00a0be blameless.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A Texas based bank is suing a customer over 1.66M stolen in a 2012 cyberheist. The bank had\u00a0initially believed that the cash had been routed out of the country but now believes it is within the\u00a0country. The cash is believed to be held in an account in a U.S bank that has already been frozen […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3121,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[94,65,83,62,48,49,25,50],"class_list":["post-7278","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-security-news","tag-china-cyberheists","tag-dual-controls","tag-illegal-wire-transfer","tag-krebs","tag-malware","tag-money-mules","tag-password-stealing-malware","tag-phishing"],"yoast_head":"\n