The servers of Dow Jones & Co and a number of other news publications were broken into by a group of Russian hackers recently. Investigations and reports reveal that the hackers infiltrated Dow Jones to steal-market moving information before it became accessible to the public. Until recently, the popular notion has been that it was a lower-grade intrusion. However, recent reports reveal that it’s far more serious than that.
There has been no statement issued from the State Department or the White house on this incident. However, Bloomberg reports that the Securities and Exchange Commission, Secret Service, and Federal Bureau of Investigation are deeply involved in its investigation. Although there is a bit of skepticism from Dow Jones about Bloomberg’s report, the FBI confirms it is looking into the hacking incident. However, they’ve refused to comment on the participation of agencies in this investigation.
Dow Jones revealed a week back that the contact information and payment cards of about 3,500 individuals were at risk as a result of hackers infiltrating its systems. Dow Jones also revealed that between August 2012 and July 2015, its systems experienced unauthorized access at certain times. However, it remains largely unclear if the stolen information included news stories, or embargoed financial data.
This news comes at a time when there have been several other hacking episodes involving sensitive market information. Today, hackers are in hot pursuit of market-moving, non-public trading information. Hackers steal this sensitive information and pass it onto traders for a fee. As a result of this, financial markets in this day and age have become vulnerable. This is a challenge law enforcement officials are trying to overcome. They are working tirelessly to keep pace with cyber-criminals involved in moneymaking schemes.
The annual report of Dow Jones reveals that about 1.1 million active users get access to global business content through its Factiva service. The report shows that on or before the date of publication, more than four thousand sources make information available via Factiva. The report also reveals that financial professionals and investors get access to more than 16,000 news items each day through Dow Jones Newswires.
Coming back to the hacking incident, investigations reveal that this intrusion may have been pre-meditated. It is likely that traders paid the hackers in advance so that they could gain access to certain types of data. However, the reports do not dismiss the fact that the hackers were opportunistic and wanted to sell the data to traders or competitors for large sums. After all, when it falls into the “right hands,” embargoed data has tremendous value.
Today, hackers regularly infiltrate information-based companies. The Chief Executive Officer of Dow Jones William Lewis revealed on October 9th that the infiltration of Dow Jones was part of a campaign that aimed to victimize several other information-based companies. Jones William Lewis also revealed that law enforcement officials informed the company of this breach. However, Dow Jones itself had no evidence of it. According to the FBI, the investigation is ongoing and they hope to conclude it shortly.
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