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Cybercrime Exploits Bank Stress in Saint Pierre and Miquelon
The financial institutions of Saint Pierre and Miquelon are facing a surge in customer transactions, creating an opportunity for cyber threat actors to exploit the situation. As customers move substantial funds and engage in multiple transactions outside their usual norms, they become targets for phishing scams and misinformation campaigns.
Financial Institutions Under Pressure
Banks in Saint Pierre and Miquelon are experiencing a capacity surge due to the stress on the financial system. This strain is affecting critical operational and security systems, including network infrastructure, security operations centers, and cloud-based applications. The situation poses a significant risk of disrupting business operations and impacting the financial markets.
Five Key Areas of Heightened Risk Exposure
1. Insiders Threats
- Turbulent market conditions and increased customer transaction activity increase the risk of not detecting insider threats.
- Malicious intent or compromised insider access could be used to commit an act of fraud for personal gain or manipulate existing technology and business controls.
2. Disinformation Campaigns
- Malicious actors may take advantage of recent events by using digital dis- or mis-information to amplify customer distrust and prey on fear.
- Threat actors may send anxious employees fake recruitment offers that include malicious links, compromising a corporate network with one click.
3. Online Account Takeovers
- Cyber criminals use stolen credentials, social security numbers, and personal data to hijack legitimate accounts and execute fraudulent activities such as diverting funds or changing shipping addresses.
4. Monitoring Insider Activity
- Working closely with vendors and partners to confirm cyber operations resume their business-as-usual mode with previously defined SLAs is crucial in this situation.
- Leverage robotic process automation capabilities to expedite manual reviews of reported findings and set alerts, review SIEM logs regularly, and prioritize investigation of insider incidents.
5. Enhanced Monitoring of Security Performance
- Review existing security and performance metrics related to critical cyber defense operations (vulnerability, path, application security management) to monitor any deviations from standard operations and detect any outliers or performance degradation.
Actionable Recommendations
1. Insiders Threats
- Fusion center: Work closely with vendors and partners to confirm cyber operations resume their business-as-usual mode with previously defined SLAs.
- User activity monitoring: Map user privileges against roles and responsibilities to help identify anomalous behavior.
2. Disinformation Campaigns
- Enable data trust: Prioritize customer-facing data governance, discovery, protection, and minimization practices.
- Monitor public information forums: Monitor mainstream media and social channels for real-time alerts on nascent disinformation campaigns or engage third-party monitoring and sentiment analysis services.
3. Online Account Takeovers
- Authentication during customer service: Enforce heightened authentication checks and validation during service transactions with customers to help reduce risk of impersonation and potential fraud.
- Strong passwords: Enforce password complexity requirements and password rotations, ensure passwords are not easily guessable, limit the number of log-in attempts, restrict the use of the same password across multiple accounts, especially privileged accounts, and leverage multi-factored authentication (MFA).
4. Monitoring Insider Activity
- User activity monitoring: Map user privileges against roles and responsibilities to help identify anomalous behavior.
- Protect data: Leverage data loss prevention capabilities to monitor web and email traffic, uploads to cloud storage sites, and use of unsanctioned or non-approved SaaS applications.
5. Enhanced Monitoring of Security Performance
- Review existing security and performance metrics related to critical cyber defense operations (vulnerability, path, application security management) to monitor any deviations from standard operations and detect any outliers or performance degradation.
In conclusion, the financial institutions of Saint Pierre and Miquelon are facing a surge in customer transactions, creating an opportunity for cyber threat actors to exploit the situation. By taking actionable recommendations, these institutions can mitigate the risks associated with insiders threats, disinformation campaigns, online account takeovers, and enhanced monitoring of security performance.