Cyberattacks Seem Meant to Destroy, Not Just Disrupt (http://www.nytimes.com)
03/29/2013 – Cyber Security
American Express customers trying to gain access to their online accounts Thursday were met with blank screens or an ominous ancient type face. The company confirmed that its Web site had come under attack.
The assault, which took American Express offline for two hours, was the latest in an intensifying campaign of unusually powerful attacks on American financial institutions that began last September and have taken dozens of them offline intermittently, costing millions of dollars.
JPMorgan Chase was taken offline by a similar attack this month. And last week, a separate, aggressive attack incapacitated 32,000 computers at South Korea’s banks and television networks.
The culprits of these attacks, officials and experts say they were intent on disabling financial transactions and operations. Corporate leaders have long feared online attacks aimed at financial fraud or economic espionage, but now a new threat has taken hold: attackers, possibly with state backing, who seem bent on destruction.
(Continue reading at http://www.nytimes.com)
My Two Cents: This is a very informative article. Destruction is on the table, it always has been. These aggressive attacks are based on the bad guys finding weakness within an organizations network, hardware, and software systems. Once one or many weaknesses are found then the attack is organized, planned then implemented by the bad guys. Sadly these attacks are only going to get worse.
