Computer hackers breached the local authority bank accounts in November 2008 and redirected 34.000 dollars in taxpayer money to Russia in an elaborate computer hacking scheme.

The scheme,involved hacking into the local authority computers to steal passwords to withdraw cash through wire transfers, there were four illegal transfers found during a 10-day period.

The money was wired to banks in Florida and Georgia in the United States and at least one transfer was traced to St. Petersburg, Russia. That has law enforcement convinced that Russian organized crime is involved.

Hackers used a virus known as a \”sniffer\” to snag the password and security information from the computer system, that type of virus is also called a key-stroke logger.

The hacking was first discovered on Nov. 14 by the town Treasurer when he discovered the bogus transfers when he went to pay the local authorities bills for that week and didn\’t have enough money. Bank officials told him that he had authorized the transfers in question, which led him to call in police immediately.

The local authorities quickly secured its computer network and they were able to follow the money trail to Florida.

Officials believe the initial computer breach occurred on Nov. 4th 2008. \”Had this been going on for months, you can imagine how much money would be involved\”. A small amount of money from one of the transfers was still in a bank account in Florida.

A man attempting to withdraw those funds was questioned by police who found he was employed for what he thought was a legitimate company. That man, answering a newspaper ad, opened a bank account and provided his employer with access to that account information. His job was to move money between accounts for a fee. The Florida man has not been charged.

The theft of $34,000 from the local authorities bank account is part of growing underground economy centered on cyber crime. It\’s massive, it\’s growing and it\’s international. \”There are cyber criminals and cyber victims in many different countries.

The hackers stole the password and security information from the local authorities bank account and made four illegal wire transfers.

Bank officials told the town the wire transfers were made using the treasurer\’s name and password. Investigators believe the hackers breached the local authorities computers using a virus that logged key strokes.

Cyber crime is booming in places like Eastern Europe and Russia where there are people with technological skills and few job opportunities. That\’s the combination that adds up to trouble. We do see the threat coming from all parts of the globe. There are elaborate networks that include people who don\’t even know each other working in different countries. It can have a lot of moving pieces, It insulates the mastermind.

It\’s difficult to quantify the magnitude of the cyber crime problem beyond calling it \”massive. Symantec released a report that indicates a thriving underground economy. Cyber thieves are finding new ways to thwart security to steal credit card and bank account information. Knowing that more people are aware that they shouldn\’t open attached files, cyber criminals try to lure victims to Web sites through links embedded in e-mails.

If local authorities computer systems can be breached like this, as an individual you\’ve got to keep that in mind. You might think,you are in charge of a small community and therefor they\’re not going to come after you. They are only interested in a big city, but there\’s nothing too small for them. If they can get some profit out of it, they will.

Symantec\’s year-long study found that the cumulative value of the stolen information, the majority of which are credit cards and bank accounts, was more than $276 million. And the company says that is only a fraction of the underground economy.

If all of the stolen credit cards and bank accounts were liquidated, the number would exceed $7 billion.

Measures authorities and companies as well as individuals can take to avoid hackers getting into their bank accounts are amongst the following;

Verify that security patches, anti-virus, and anti-spyware software are up to date
Ensure that you have a firewall that is properly configured
Never open a suspicious e-mail
Be especially wary of opening files that end in \”.exe\”
Safeguard your password
Encrypt the hard drive of your laptop to protect contents in case it is lost or stolen
If you are using a wireless connection, change the default network name (SSID) and password, and avoid connecting to public Wi-Fi locations