South Korea Warns AI-Linked Bank Hacks Exposed Data at 7 Financial Firms
Updated
Updated · Financial Times · Oct 6
South Korea Warns AI-Linked Bank Hacks Exposed Data at 7 Financial Firms
3 articles · Updated · Financial Times · Oct 6
Summary
Seven South Korean financial firms suffered data leaks in a week of suspected AI-assisted cyber attacks, prompting President Lee Jae Myung to warn of a new threat and police to open a full investigation.
About 25,000 Shinhan Bank customers were exposed after an attacker bypassed identity checks on a loan-broker portal, while Yegaram Savings Bank lost data on roughly 40,000 customers and Welcome Savings Bank on 2,200 corporate clients.
The attacks appear to have hit weaker third-party systems rather than core payment networks, and identical or similar IP addresses suggest at least some breaches may have come from a single attacker.
Officials and researchers said evidence pointed to Artex, a Chinese-language open-source AI tool for finding and testing vulnerabilities, as regulators ordered 24-hour monitoring and asked cloud providers to block suspect overseas IPs.
The wave is likely to sharpen scrutiny of South Korean cyber security after earlier breaches at Coupang, TVing, LotteCard and KT, and amid wider global concern over AI-enabled hacking.