Matthew 24:6 You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come.
Editor’s Note: In May 2011, the Wall Street Journal published an article titled “Pentagon: Cyber Attacks Can Count as Acts of War.” The article began, “The Pentagon has concluded that computer sabotage coming from another country can constitute an act of war, a finding that for the first time opens the door for the U.S. to respond using traditional military force.”
South Africa has been struck by a massive cyber-fraud attack that experts are calling one of the biggest in the nation’s history.
A computer virus nicknamed “Dexter”, after the serial killer character in a U.S. TV show, compromised the payment card systems of thousands of businesses, restaurants and hotels.
Losses are thought to be in the tens of millions.
The Dexter code was used to make a series of attacks in the U.S., UK and other countries toward the end of 2012. It skims the information from magnetic cards in a way that allows a criminal to make a duplicate card.
Interpol and Europol believe the hackers behind the attack are based in Europe and have said their investigation is making “good progress.”
“Normal anti-virus software would probably have cleaned up Dexter but it was a particular custom-built variant, which was not detectable with the normal scanning software that everybody’s got,” Walter Volker, chief executive of the Payment Association of South Africa, told the BBC.
