Viruses/Worms News

Russian scammers infect Diebold ATMs

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Cybercriminals have figured out how to infect Windows-based Diebold ATMs with malware capable of skimming credit card numbers and passwords, security experts said.

The malware has only affected Russian, Ukranian and American currency transactions within Russia, Diebold has confirmed. Security experts said the malware uses insider access rather than an external device.

The cybercriminal would have to return to the hacked ATM to swipe a special card that instructs the machine to issue a receipt containing the stolen information.

Security experts said the cybercriminals figured out how to access the Diebold DLL (dynamic-linked library) and that the malware had to issue the right code to pull protected information.

Diebold disclosed that it issued a security update in January for its ATMs running a Windows-based operating system.

The company said in a letter to its customers that machines in Russia had been infected but did not provide specifics on the attacks.

Security experts said the nature of the attacks make it unlikely the ATM scam will spread far. The ATM skimmer’s exposure in recovering the data when coming back to get the device makes it too risky.