It's been reported that virtual currency, such as bitcoin, is one of the culprits of bank cyber-attacks. This is a claim that is grossly exaggerated and hardly responsible. More closely it has been an infrequent indirect happening at best.
The reports are stemming from a report released by the US Office of the Comptroller of the Currency that mentions virtual currency directly once in a 34 page report. On the same page there is an indirect association and bitcoin is not mentioned at all.
Apples and Apples
Lets get our facts straight here. What the report actually states is that "banks" and "other businesses" are at risk of being infected by ransomware, which really means they are at risk for being idiots and not backing up their data. This somehow equates to virtual currency being the avenue to hacking the banks of the world.
Well first of all, hacking a bank is not that difficult and you don't need bitcoin, virtual currency, or even much technical knowledge at all to do so. They have piss poor security.
Secondly, cyber-criminals using virtual currency in their ransomware demands are the risk to "banks and other businesses" and not virtual currency. Poor IT practices and idiots clicking on shit they shouldn't be clicking on "enables" cyber-attacks on banks, not virtual currency. Lets call the apples, the apples.
The report goes on to indirectly accuse, by a shirttail, virtual currency for raising funds for cyberattacks, although no example or proof what-so-ever is presented:
New platforms and technologies, such as virtual currencies, enable anonymity for...", and "... also help cyber criminals raise funds to pay for physical and cyber attacks.As far as the anonymity, so does cash and so does allot of things. Virtual currency also doesn't help raise anything without the complete cooperation of other payment/receiving methods and tools in the FinTech space. It's certainly not doing this by itself.
That's it. That's all the 34 page report had to say and it was a stretch. It was so insignificant it appears more like the author was paid to "dig up" anything that they could possibly use to negatively speak about virtual currency.
You can view the accusations on page 8 and the full report is here.
Report by dinbits
Image source: occ.gov
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