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Bank heist: Retd manager snuck into bank server room 3 days before crime
On October 15, the hackers were able to steal ₹72 crore from the bank after carrying out a successful transaction. However, the withdrawal was detected in time and authorities froze the account/s to which the money was transferred.
A few laptops, remote access tools, an internet dongle and a few technophiles were how a 146 crore-bank heist, albeit an unsuccessful one, was pulled off.
In a first-of-its-kind ‘technical’ investigation, the UP cybercrime cell on Friday claimed to have cracked the case of a failed attempt to steal ₹146 crore from Uttar Pradesh Cooperative Bank (UPCB) on October 15. The accused had mischievously installed a laptop in the bank network. That was how the hackers remotely accessed the bank server, the police said.
“It is but clear now how retired manager RS Dubey helped the three tech-savvy persons hack into the bank server. As per their plan, the manager, with the help of his aides, secretly installed a laptop and remote access tools within the bank network. The equipment were hid at the server room on the eighth floor of the bank building. The accused visited the bank multiple times and finally succeeded in attaching the laptop with the bank server on October 12, three days before the failed cyber-robbery attempt,” cybercrime senior superintendent of police (SSP) Triveni Singh said.
The SSP said the dongle was attached to the laptop so that it remained functional and could be remotely accessed from another laptop from outside the bank. He said the IDs and password of two serving employees were compromised as a ‘keylogger’ had been secretly installed into their systems before October 12.
The laptop with whitelisted IP address, the dongle and two more computers’ with keylogger were seized and being examined.
“After the system was in place, the accused managed to secure the ID and password of two bank employees, which were used to transfer money from the bank’s server,” Singh explained. “A computer emergency response team (CERT-India) was called. It helped the state cybercrime cell in cracking the case”.
The police had on Thursday arrested the retired manager, RS Dubey, and the owner of Sagar Solar, Sukh Sagar Chauhan. Dubey allegedly is the main conspirator while two bank accounts of Chauhan’s firm were used to transfer money from the UPCB server.
On October 15, the hackers were able to steal ₹72 crore from the bank after carrying out a successful transaction. However, the withdrawal was detected in time and authorities froze the account/s to which the money was transferred.
