In one of the biggest leaks in Pakistan’s banking history, around 69,189 bank card details have been leaked to the internet. An estimate according to Group-IB, which made this revelation, puts the combined worth of the cards at a staggering $3.5 million. Around 96% of the card details belong to Meezan Bank alone.
Group-IB specializes in preventing cyber-attacks and according to the company, these bank card details have emerged on the dark web and are now up for grabs. This is the second biggest sale of bank account info from Pakistan from the past 6 months which may give indications that there is a combined threat to our financial sector at large.
According to a statement from Meezan Bank to ProPakistani, they are already aware of the stated situation but have noticed no anomaly in their systems. To tackle the previous leak, they not only asked users to change their PIN codes but also included several security measures to further encrypt transactions. They have also introduced a SkimGuard service which protects high-value transactions.
The first set of card dumps was leaked to the Dark Web on 24th January 2019 and it had details of 1,535 cards of which Meezan Bank issued 1,457. The second dump was a huge one having details of more than 67,654 cards. Each card is being sold at $50 because it also includes the PIN code.
Pakistan’s institutions seriously need to up their game if this is to be considered a coordinated attack. If you are from Meezan bank, we would advise you to change your PIN code immediately to avoid any untoward situation.
