ATM Infection Has Now Spread to Malaysia

A Latin American crime syndicate apparently retrieved $391,000 from teller machines within 48 hours.

The incident marked the first time in Malaysia that a virus was used to steal money from ATMs.

The malicious code at work is thought to be “ULSSN.”

"We found it when we were going through the system. The virus had rebooted the ATM system and allowed the syndicate to withdraw money multiple times from the targeted machines," Bukit Aman's Cyber Crime and Multimedia Investigation deputy director SAC Mohd Kamarudin said.

To date, there have been seven hacking cases involving two banks – a local and an international institution.

With a large foothold in the country, the syndicate was able to deploy accomplices to execute the heists simultaneously in three states.

"This is because they knew that the bank and the authorities would already be on high alert once the thefts were detected. The bank would have boosted their security by then," Kamaruddin said.

The crooks inserted a CD containing the virus into a computer system to compromise the ATMs. The scheme also involved the use of a SIM card.