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Bank Employee Infects ATMs with Malware to Secretly Swipe Thousands

by Amar Toor on April 12, 2010 at 11:10 AM

Robbing a bank may no longer be the cinematic feat it once was, but as one North Carolina banker has proven, it can now be way more insidious. 37-year-old Rodney Reed Caverly, from Charlotte, has been charged with one count of computer fraud after allegedly installing malware on several Bank of America ATMs over a seven-month period ending in October 2009. As Wired reports, the former Bank of America employee used the malware to withdraw thousands of dollars without leaving any trace whatsoever. Government prosecutors haven't specified exactly how much money Caverly is accused of stealing, but an official charging document said that the amount surpassed the $5,000 statutory minimum. The defendant, who is also the former founder and CEO of software development company Slovidian, LLC, has reportedly entered a plea agreement with prosecutors, and is scheduled to appear in court on April 13.

Charges against Caverly, ironically enough, were filed on the exact same day that Visa issued an official warning to American banks about similarly virulent ATM malware that has spread across Eastern Europe. Last year, a malicious code was discovered on about 20 individual ATMs across Russia and Ukraine, and apparently gave criminals access to PIN codes, bank card data, and the ability to withdraw any amount of money available from a given cash dispenser. Now, according to Visa, a similar version has popped up in at least 16 ATMs in the US.

Although there hasn't been irrefutable proof of any link between the East European malware and Caverly's own attack, Nick Perocco, head of the SpiderLabs Incident Response Team at Trustwave, says there are some obvious similarities. As Perocco speculates, Caverly could've very well found a copy of the East European software and altered it for his own purposes, since both versions share the same fundamental feature: the ability to steal lots of cash without leaving any trail. [From: Wired; via: Geekosystem]

Tags: ATM, attack, bank, bank fraud, BankFraud, BankOfAmerica, banks, eastern europe, EasternEurope, malware, money, slovidian, top, visa

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